Sometimes Face to Face is better

A lot has been going on and I know I have not blogged nearly enough. Last night, we had to meet in Teleplace rather than F2F because of the weather. There were good and bad points to this. Good = didn't have to drive to Hickory and risk icy conditions. Bad = still had to take the kids to mom's and do the class there then had to drive home afterwards in the icy conditions. However, the icy conditions weren't bad yet, so all was well. Now, about class. This time, it was mostly ok to work in teleplace, but some of the work would have been easier/more productive had we been able to meet face to face. The sticky note activity was fun but a little chaotic. That's ok because that is just how groupwork is sometimes. We worked through it as a group, each doing his/her part and that is just what has to happen.

When we broke off into partners, I initially joined with another student that I seem to meet in teleplace often--Cammie. We tend to be online at midnight and very late hours, so we have often helped each other with midnight-oil-burning. Another student joined Cammie and me; then I got a private message from Ann. She needed a partner. So I decided to break off and be in Ann's group; she trusts me to help her because I walked her through the Active World. We had a bit of trouble from the start. We went into a workroom but had trouble with Ann's audio so I was trying to put the correct files up and do all the talking with Ann by texting. When we finally got our work posted to start working on it, it was time to return to the big group. In that situation, Ann and I would have been able to get much more accomplished if we were meeting face to face. So, although working in the virtual world is great and so flexible, there are still some experiences I would rather have in person. That is one reason why I chose to join this cohort. I had considered getting my MLS from an online program and generally, I do fine in online courses; I learn well by reading. However, there is true value in learning from face to face interactions with real humans and I prefer that method of learning. I am looking forward to exploring some of the selection tools on my own to get used to what is out there.