Dear Loomio pals:

It seems social distancing will be a reality for some time, however our need for sharing information and learning from each other will continue, so I thought this might be a good moment to produce a guide to online learning for worker co-operatives. I do have some experience, including an ancient dissertation on moderating online conferences (see Some background for details if you’re curious) and back in 2013, Co-operantics (Nathan Brown & myself) persuaded Jim Brown to allow us to deliver the Understanding Co-operative Enterprise section of the ILM Core Competencies Programme online for 9 participants who had expressed an interest. We used OnSync, beginning our preparation in September 2013 with a technical support session in early October. There were 6 sessions in all, from mid-October to mid-December, with follow up tutorial sessions in early January 2014. (See Some background for an extract from the participants’ feedback).

Rather than write the guide myself, I thought it better to ask Solidfund members if anyone would be interested in contributing? I am aware that despite my early interest, my actual experience is thin, and that there may well be people with more recent experience on here. So please do respond below if you are interested, and perhaps haven’t got anything better to do in these strange times!

I thought it would work best if I started writing a first draft, available on Google docs at:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1L7eoyOHuQW7cgkrpnQ33aF3m9b-qaCNp3RjBRkGCglM/edit?usp=sharing

Structured under the following headings:

1.      What do I mean by co-operative learning?  How can we replicate those concepts and techniques in an online workshop or webinar?

2.      Organising

3.      Designing

4.      Delivery

5.      Evaluation

6.      Resources list

So, if anyone has an interest in working on this with me, I’d be delighted. If you do, please amend/edit the document, and perhaps add any comments at the end and save as a new version, rather than use Track Changes which I find rather cumbersome if more than one person is doing the reviewing.

Some background:

1. Extract from feedback Core Competencies Online UCE programme 2013/2014

Useful/enjoyable

·         Good learning space

·         Use it as a discussion facility, to talk to tutor

·         Works in a small group

Challenging

·         Shame that people haven’t turned up

·         Mandy’s team struggle with finance

·         Online finance ok if you’ve got basic financial knowledge

Technical

·         2 computers using same IP address was a problem, we have both been thrown out – no idea why, in one particular session, kept happening

·         Works better at home, not so good in the office, noise levels, interruptions

·         Have to play around with Options/Preferences

Recommendations

·         Circulate OnSync guide in advance

·         Use chat for process

·         Have 5 min tech sessions with each participant (as well as the half hour familiarisation session)

2. ‘An Investigation into the role of the moderator in computer conferencing on a CPD programme’ MA dissertation 1998

It is unbelievably 22 years since I studied for a Masters in ‘Post Compulsory Education and Training’ which clumsy title in effect meant ‘Adult Education and Training’. My dissertation was based on interviews I carried out with CPD students at Greenwich University who were using software called Lotus Notes – a very comprehensive computer conference platform that included email, calendars, contact management, discussion forums, file sharing and instant messaging (no video, in those days it was all text)

Afterwards I was keen to develop a co-operative learning approach based on groups of co-operators learning together – 3 participants in one co-op and 2 in another, for example, working together, communicating and learning from one another. There were many advantages to this approach: significant opportunities for inter-co-op peer learning, and all the benefits of online learning such as flexibility, recordings and innovative opportunities for collaboration.

Over the years I tried in vain to encourage the institutions I was involved with to adopt online learning, but without any success. The technology then was clumsy and not intuitive, and I think now it was just too soon, unless you’d had the exposure to the concepts that I had experienced, it was difficult to imagine what co-operative online learning would be like, so people were reluctant to experiment.

However I did a lot of reading and even if the technology has been superseded by modern platforms, I think the concepts remain the same, so I have added a couple resources from writers and teachers who are still active in online learning and who in my opinion have useful guidance to offer.

Hi Kate,

Sounds like a great plan. Where do you want to start? Is it just
a guide or should we also be delivering some online training of
trainers aimed at coops?

Matthew

Hi Matthew, my idea was to test the water, to see if anyone was interested, and to provide a guide for worker co-ops, either on my own or with contributions from others. But that's a great idea & of course it would be a bit meta since we would be modelling how to do it! I wonder if it would fit with the Barefoot co-op trainers programme? maybe Phase 2?

There's a webinar on running conferences online, 3pm-4pm 29th April. It's free but you need to register:

https://www.alt.ac.uk/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=510

These are academics with years of experience in teaching and researching online learning, so I imagine language might be a bit scholarly, I'll check it out anyway.

I am being contacted by some organizations that are seeking an online
learning platform, one is the Boston Public School system. There is a
pool of funding available from all of the summer programs that have been
funded and now will not happen, yet the money must be spent. I am sure
this is happening to schools, foundations and orgs in everyone's area.
Think creatively...

I am working with the Free Software Foundation who are putting together an online platform for teachers to hold classes by combining several free software products that are available, Canvas LMS and BigBlueButton.com and NextCloud etc. I have been testing for a few days and it looks really promising - if anyone wishes to test drive it, email me. [email protected]

I did a demo for the Boston Public School system that is desperate to get off of Google classrooms and they also have an interest in Free Software! They loved it.
This will be a solution that anyone can run on their own server and not have to worry about privacy and security concerns from a Cororation. I will post when there are some trusted web hosts running this LMS.

Hi, we had a brief chat today, and it seems that Rhizome energy for a guide is less than for delivering online training for facilitators/trainers aimed at co-ops. You've already made a flying start on the document by the looks of it. Of course we'll respond to specific questions ( we might be able to offer some ideas for resources, or a case study of a successful online learning intervention etc). Sorry not to have more capacity to be more involved - everyone's stretched at the moment. M