Facilitating Online

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Chat Room - A photo by iBoy Daniel
Facilitation is a rare and valuable skill to have. It is a service that is often used in conferences, debates, panels and tutorials, or simply where groups of people are meeting and need someone to help negotiate meaning and understanding, and to keep everyone engaged and on task.
  • Good facilitation depends on good communication skills.
  • Good online facilitation depends on good online communication skills.

This course is designed to help people to access and interpret models, research, and develop professional expertise in online facilitation. After completing this course people should be confident in facilitating online and/or be able to critique and offer advice to other people in online facilitation. The next facilitated course started 27 July 2009 and runs to 4 December 2009.

Participation in this course is free. To join the facilitated course, simply complete the tasks in the Orientation section of this page before the start date. Alternatively, you can start and finish at any time, working through the schedule at a pace that suits you. If you think you will benefit receiving focused and personalised learning support, assessment services, or a certificate in recognition for completing, please consider enrolling as a formal participant (fees apply). You can inquire about formal enrollment by emailing: Sarah Stewart.


Contents

[edit] Assignments

Vicky Obst, a project manager with Dalberg on an assignment in Nepal

There are 3 assignments designed to ensure you study the material, communicate with others and have the opportunity to put into practice what you learn. These assignments are what is used for assessment - should you require formal accreditation.

[edit] Assignment 1: Your course blog

Set up or use an existing blog for this course. Your blog will represent your online presence and efforts, and will be a key communication tool. Your finished blog will be used as evidence for assessment.

Follow the course schedule, read the assigned material, complete all tasks, participate in events, and post notes to your blog for each topic in the schedule. You should also post progress reports on your assignments. Title and tag your posts so that facilitators, assessors and other participants can easily locate your work. The common tag word for the course is FOC09. To keep up with the contributions of other participants, you may wish to set up an (RSS) news reader and subscribe to their blogs. This will assist you in learning from the work of others.

Your blogging should demonstrate your understanding of the topics, tasks and events, and should include original thoughts, synthesis and references to the work of others. Don't just summarize readings or events. Making connections between the weekly topics, or previous blogging (of your own or of other participants) is strongly encouraged.

[edit] Assignment 2: Facilitate an online event

Plan for and facilitate an online event for the course mini conference. Your task is to identify a topic of interest expressed by participants in this course. You are to arrange for a guest speaker, panel or other online activity and facilitate that event as part of a series of events by other participants. You will need to negotiate with the guest speaker/s, arrange times and locations, promote and document the event and facilitate attendance and delivery. You will coordinate your session with others in this course so that together, and you will field inquiries and handle technical issues during your session. The course facilitator will coordinate the week 9 conference over all.

The following plan might help you to prepare:

After you have established an event which you will facilitate, create a plan of how you will facilitate it. Include things like:

  • Title for the session
  • The aim of the session
  • Promotions for the session (contact list, flier, bios, summary)
  • Key links for the event, dates and times, background information, and discussion starters
  • A description of technical support services available
  • A contingency plan for technical problems, poor or over attendance, and other disruptions
  • An indication of whether recording will be done and where it will be made available after the event

To do

1. Add your event name and details to the course mini conference page.

2. Start a discussion thread for your event in the course mini conference discussion page, and monitor discussion

3. Post your plan details to your blog (see above points).

[edit] Assignment 3: Evaluate a facilitated online event

Report on your own or another's facilitation of an event in course mini conference.

Post to your blog a report on the following:

  • How the event was organised and promoted - adequate information, support (technical and access), relevant for the audience.
  • Whether the event was managed and conducted smoothly - particularly noting the way the facilitator handled any disruptions.
  • Did the facilitator make efforts to ensure that all participants knew where they were supposed to be and when, and arrange technical support for people?
  • The way the facilitator set the stage, made introductions, explained the aims, and whether he/she managed to remain neutral and facilitatory.
  • Whether the facilitator did a round up, drew closure and indicated where recordings and other follow up materials would be made available.
  • General comments and additions.

[edit] Schedule

Below is a schedule for the course. This is still being finalised and is a work in progress. The next facilitated course where you can move through this schedule with others interested in the course starts 27 July 2009. If you join us in that course, please try to keep up with this schedule so that we can more or less be at a similar point and benefit from one another's work.

[edit] Orientation

A base transceiver station (BTS) is a piece of equipment that facilitates wireless communication between user equipment (UE) and a network
A week spent orientating yourself into the course, the commitment required, the assignments and what else is involved. For those new to this way of learning online, this week will seem daunting. Get through it and the rest of the course will flow for you nicely.

To do

Please try to complete the following tasks before the first course meeting on 31 July
  1. Set up a blog for your weekly work in this course. If you already have a blog, you are welcome to use that so long as you can clearly indicate what posts are for this course. If you are new to blogging, refer to Blogger help resources.
  2. Post to your blog a little bit about you and why you are joining in with the course.
  3. Introduce yourself to the course by adding your blog's web address to Participants page.
  4. Prepare your computer and attend the first of our regular meetings on the 31st of July.

Extra resources

[edit] 3rd August What is an online community?

Map of Online communities by Randall Munroe
Most people use the phrase "online community" very loosely. You will hear educationalists use it to refer to communities of practice, classes, groups, professional bodies, teams, networks, you name it - they have all been referred to as communities at some stage, and when they prodimantly operate through the Internet they are called online communities. But what is an online community really - especially if we want to relate the words to their true and common meaning? Is it a group of people who communicate online, and through that connection they share a sense of belonging and responsibility for one another? Is an online community like this necessary for work teams, classes, professional bodies and all those other things that have been called communities? In this course we will be looking for online communities in very different places. It is important that we try and develop an understanding of what exactly we are looking for, and techniques for looking. What is an online community?


To do

1. Look at these links:

  • An anthropological introduction to YouTube - Michael Wesch video presented at the Library of Congress, June 23rd 2008.
  • Groups and Networks video of Stephen Downes 2006. You will need a broadband connection speed to view this video, and I suggest you open the link, press play and then press pause for 10 minutes or so as to let the video load ahead some. Same technique for dial up, but wait much longer on pause.
  • This, That and the Other, by Mark Pesce
  • Building Online Communities - The Internet exists to improve communication. Communities can grow anywhere communication occurs.

2. Referring to at least 2 of the items above, write a post to your blog that summarises what they say about online community. Conclude with your own list of at least 3 forms of evidence that YOU would look for when determining an online community.

3. Give feedback as a comment on the blog post of at least one other person from this course.

4. Attend a meeting to collaboratively develop a list of features to look for when identifying an online community, and to begin a discussion on how such communities would benefit from facilitation services. We will use this list when looking for online communities later in the course. Meeting time and venue TBA

Extra resources

[edit] 17th August Facilitating, moderating, or teaching

A meeting taking place in Khammouane Province of Laos, March 2006, as part of the Lao Extension Approach. Meeting is being held in village temple, participants are farmers. Who do YOU think the facilitator is in this picture?
Many people either don't understand the differences, or too easily confuse the different roles of a facilitator, moderator and teacher. Some teachers believe that teaching is an act of facilitation. Some facilitators see their main role as moderating discussion and keeping order. Over these two weeks we will consider the differences in these three roles and attempt to describe situations where they might be mutually exclusive from one another.

To do

1. Try to determine what the different roles and behaviors are for these three roles:

  • Facilitator
  • Moderator
  • Teacher

You might like to look for their definitions on something like Wikipedia.

2. As a post to your blog, answer each of the following questions:

  • When might the role of a teacher undermine the role of a facilitator?
  • When might the role of a moderator undermine the role of a facilitator?
  • When might the role of a facilitator undermine the role of a teacher or moderator?

Try and identify some of the skills required to carry out the different roles and post these on your blog.

3. Attend a meeting to discuss these roles and work collaboratively to develop a list of skills and techniques for facilitation.

Extra resources

[edit] 31st August Looking for online community: Discussion forums

Religious Colloquium of Marburg, anonymous, wood carving, 1557 By invitation of the Landgrave Philipp of Hesse, Luther and Zwingli came to Marburg in September of 1529. They were accompanied by some of their followers, Melanchthon being among these. They were to settle their dispute about communion, but were not successful.
Discussion forums are probably the most used platforms for online communication and community development. Car lovers use them, software developers use them, subcultures use them. A discussion forum is primarily a text based mode of communication where someone will post a start to a thread and people will respond to that thread. Often, many threads can be going at the same time, with discussion lasting from a few hours to years in some cases! Google Groups and Yahoo Groups host many discussion forums, with the added feature of sending email to participants. Other forums might not have the email feature, relying on users returning to the forum to post.


To do

1. Locate an example of an online forum and post to your blog a link to the forum with an assessment of the forum based on the list of identifying features we collaboratively developed.

2. Interview a member of the forum you are looking at and obtain comments and ideas on how the forum might benefit from facilitation services - such as a coordinated event to help focus people around a particular issue, or the writing of a summary to close a thread in the forum.

3. Join this course's email forum and post an email with a link to your blog post containing your write up and interview.

4. Some of you will be asked to present your findings in a meeting TBA


Extra resources

[edit] 14th September Looking for online community: Blog networks

A blogging network is what we are building in this course. We each have a blog, we each should be monitoring each other's progress through an RSS newsreader, and we should be commenting and cross referencing each other's posts from time to time. Hopefully by now, we ARE doing all this and are starting to see how a blogging network can function, but ours is a small and time dependent network. Real blogging networks develop over longer periods of time and include strong and weak connections between people, and a much more diverse range of topics.

To do

1. Look at the Wikipedia entry for Blogosphere and pay particular attention to the See Also section. Read up on one of the listed blogospheres in that section and write a post to your blog that explains in your own words what a Blogging Network is and can be - cite examples.

2. Make contact with a member of a blogging network you have identified and interview them for comments and ideas on how they think their blogging network could benefit from facilitation services. It might be they'd appreciate a chance to conference with each other on a particular topic, they might like to meet each other in person, etc.

3. Some of you will be contacted to present in this topic's meeting (TBA)

Extra resources

  • Blogging - Not ‘IF’ but When and Where. UPEI presentation | Dave’s Educational Blog - Blogging, like ‘academic writing’ is a vague label that really doesn’t do justice to the complexities of the subject it is meant to cover. Blogging is appropriate any time that people need to be kept ‘up to date’ with a topic, a person, images,
  • Radio New Zealand audio recording: Focus on Politics for 16 May 2008 - Life's a blog. Kate Williamson looks at how the Internet is being used to campaign in election year. File Size:6MB
  • Classrooms as Third Places CC By Konrad Glogowski with audio recorded presentation and discussion around Konrad's research in developing a community or writers through blogging.
  • Blogosphere - Wikipedia, July 2008
  • Introduction to Blogging - part of the excellent Wordpress Codex
  • Into the Blogosphere - a series of papers and articles on blogging
  • Educational Blogging Stephen Downes 2004 paper on blogging

[edit] 28th September Looking for online community: Wiki collaborators

Some wiki communities look just like this :)
This week we will begin organising our course mini conference where you will each facilitate an online session. We will use a wiki to coordinate our events, so we can each experience collaboration through a wiki. Online communities through wikis are harder to identify as they usually focus around the creation of shared content. Wikis usually have a discussion tab with each page, and you can sometimes see community-like communication there.

To do

1. Write to your blog the initial ideas you have for your assignment 2 - facilitating your event in the course mini conference. Describe who or what you plan to bring to the group and through what channel of communication.

2. Add your proposed event to the course mini conference web page, and use that wiki page's discussion tab to negotiate and discuss and develop the mini conference. Ie. start a discussion forum thread for your proposed event and discribe your idea in more detail, including any questions or concerns you have that the group may be able to help with. Respond to other people's threads and get the wiki happening.

3. Review the links in the navigation box titled "community" to the left of this wiki, and see if you can detect key members of the Wikiversity community.

4. Join in a meeting (TBA) where your course facilitator will interview a key member of the Wikiversity community, asking where they think facilitation skills and services are needed. We will also discuss the up coming course mini conference and everyone's thoughts and ideas for it.

Extra resources

[edit] 5th October Looking for online community: Virtual Worlds

Meeting with Grad Students in Second Life - a photo by Pathfinder Linden Pathfinder Linden spoke at a weekly meeting held by grad students who are using Second Life as part of their academic research. My discussion focused on the importance of research ethics in virtual worlds. Fantastic group of folks, and they have an excellent wiki with more information about their work: http://www.simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Second_Life_Grad_Student_Colony
A virtual world is a computer-based simulated environment intended for its users to interact via avatars. These avatars are usually depicted as textual, two-dimensional, or three-dimensional graphical representations, although other forms are possible (auditory and touch sensations for example). Some, but not all, virtual worlds allow for multiple users. Wikipedia July 2008.
This week we will be focusing on the use of Second Life as a platform for interaction through an online simulated environment. It is recommended that you access a modern computer and you will need to install the Second Life client to do this week's activities. If you live close to an Internet cafe, they will be able to set you up for an optimal experience. Some people working in public institutions or large organisations have experienced restricted access to Second Life. If you work in a public institution or a large organisation, check with your computer administrator or consider completing this topic on an external computer and network.

To do

1. Download and install the Second Life client and post to your blog your Second Life user name.

2. Add your Second Life user name next to your details in the Participants list.

3. Once you have installed Second Life on your computer click this link that will start Second Life and log you in directly to Jokaydia. In this meeting you will be shown how to use Second Life and then be taken on a tour of interesting venues and projects in Second Life.

Meeting times

4. Read through the Wikipedia entry for Second Life and conduct your own research into the platform to develop a perspective on what sort of communities exist there. Write a post to your blog with ideas on how you might operate as a facilitator for a community within Second Life.

5. Continue preparations for your facilitated event at the course mini conference

Extra resources

[edit] 19th October Looking for online community: Social networking platforms

People creating their own learning... Now millions of people are able to easily build detailed accounts of their lives, developing rich online identities, made possible by free, web based social networking software. . The software automatically links people around the world who express similar interests – thus offering a network. With everyone in the network writing, linking, photographing, videoing.. creating.. their experiences, the people connected to the network learn from one another, swapping stories and resources... remixing stories and resources. Image CC By Leigh Blackall


Social networking platforms are web services that technically facilitate social networking and community development. From Facebook to Linkedin, each social networking platform has slightly different functionality and social phenomenon. In this topic we will try out the Online Facilitators Grou.ps network, and review several other social networking platforms like it.

To do

1. Join the Online Facilitators network on Grou.ps and help generate activity by creating a strong profile page, observing and interacting with other members.

3. Attend a meeting (TBA) where we discuss the features of other social networking platforms, and become administrators of the Grou.ps network so we can view the admin features of this particular platform.

4. Write up a summary of social networking platforms and include ideas on how you think facilitation would work in these contexts.

4. Finalise preparations for your facilitated event at the course mini conference

Extra resources

  • Apophenia: The Economist Debate on Social "Networking" - Given that MySpace and Facebook are ubiquitous, can social networking be defined as the "collective power of community to help inform perspectives that would not be unilaterally formed" or is it simply a distraction for students?
  • QUT News Schools' Web 2.0 ban contributes to social exclusion - Queensland University of Technology media and communication PhD candidate Tanya Notley, from the Creative Industries Faculty, said social networking sites such as MySpace, Bebo and Facebook were blocked on all Queensland State school computers, denying many students without home internet access use of these sites to learn and participate in an increasingly networked society.
  • Networks, Connections and Community: Learning with Social Software by Val Evans 2007.
  • Young People and Social Networking Services The project is designed to investigate how social networking services can and are being used to support personalised formal and informal learning by young people in schools and colleges.

[edit] 2nd November Reflect on different kinds of online communities

You should now have more understanding about the difference between a community, a group and a team. Also how the roles of a teacher, moderator and facilitator differ and the diverse range of skills each role needs. Spend this week reflecting on what you have learned so far about different online communities and the roles and skills required of an effective facilitator.

To do

1. Write a post to your blog that reviews all you have considered in this course so far. When you talk about the previous posts you have made, please link to them so we can all track back to the orginal post.

2. Be sure to read the posts of some other participants and offer comments and feedback.

[edit] 9th November Facilitate an event for the course mini conference

In these two weeks you will focus on the event that you are facilitating as part of the course mini conference. The idea is for you to organise something for the conference, such as a guest speaker or a discussion panel through webconference; a discussion forum on a social networking platform; or assisting with the preparation and promotion of the mini conference generally. This will be your chance to facilitate real events online, and to experience the dimensions to facilitation online.

To do

This is when you complete assignment 2.

1. Confirm details of your event listed in the course mini conference.

2. Actively promote your event to the rest of the participants and wider. This conference is open for anyone to attend, so take the opportunity to bring in wider audiences.

4. Facilitate your event at the mini conference and attend as many if not all other events in the conference.

5. Help document the conference by posting commentary to your blog.

[edit] 23rd November Evaluate the facilitation of an online event

Bomb-damaged Ba'ath Party HQ CC By James Gordon
So, did we survive the course mini conference? More importantly, did we learn a thing or two about facilitating online and our responsibilities to this our online community of sorts? This week we reflect on the experience and make note of the things that happened and what we learned from it all

To do

This is the week you complete assignment 3

1. Consider your own or another's facilitation of an event at the course mini conference. Review the preparations that should have been documented on the wiki's history, the wiki's discussion area, and the blog of the event facilitator.

2. Complete assignment 3 as a post to your blog

3. Attend a webconference at the end of the week to debrief the mini conference. Link and date TBA.

[edit] 30th November Round up assignments, course review

This week will be a breather period to tie up all your assignments, review and summarise your weekly blogging efforts, provide feedback to the course facilitator on the content, workloads, and other aspects, and to meet in our final web conference to discuss the topics as a whole.

To do

1. Write a closing post to your blog with links to your previous postings made for each of the 10 topics. Include a few sentences after each link that summarises what you wrote for each topic:

  • What is an online community?
  • Facilitating, moderating, or teaching
  • Discussion forums
  • Blog networks
  • Wiki collaborators
  • Virtual Worlds
  • Social networking platforms
  • Reflecting on the different kinds of online communities
  • Facilitate an event for the course mini conference
  • Evaluate the facilitation of an online event

2. Finish this closing post with feedback to the course. Did you learn new and useful things? Was it challenging enough? What could have been better? What could you have done better. Did the course facilitator do a good job? How will you apply what you have learned? Who would you recommend to do this course next time?

3. If you would like to give feedback in a more private forum, feel free to complete this evaluation form. NB: Evaluation survey is now closed 10/12/09

[edit] Related courses

[edit] Acknowledgements

This course was originally developed on Wikieducator by the Educational Development Centre of Otago Polytechnic, drawing inspiration from the Introduction to Open Education course by David Wiley and Composing free and open online educational resources by Wikiversity Editors.

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