Category: change

From the Archives: Bridges I was missing

Two large rocks in a bay with a macrame bridge of circles connecting the two.

One of the things my “lying fallow” period has afforded me is more time and focus to learn about important things I have either avoided or missed. Racism and white supremacy are some of the big ones. So as I review old blog drafts, there is sadness to see how I picked up signals in 2014 but did little to nothing to act on them. Yeah, “too busy” is a crap excuse. So with a dip back to 2014, I realized some part of me was picking up on equity issues, and on decolonization (which really confused me at first and it is a huge embarrassment. I apologize.)

So take a stroll with me back to On Equity Issues in the Maker Movement, and Implications for Making and Learning | Empathetics: Integral Life. As usual, you will get more out of this by reading the full, original post, but I appreciated the lessons, as they are another example of how boundaries trick and fool us, and finding ways to bridge across them (even if we create those same boundaries in our own minds).

There are some lessons that I think we can glean from these examples, lessons that can be heeded by others interested in making and learning who want to make sure we keep equity at the heart of the conversation. The first lesson is to bridge making practices into valued cultures of non-dominant youth. Dreamyard, as an example, has teens creating musical instruments, and brings fashion crafting into its programming. The second is to link making practices with taking action on social justice issues. Both NySci and MOUSE do this when they, respectively, engage in making for the purposes of shedding light on environmental conditions in a neighborhood or creating technologies that make life easier for those with disabilities. And a final lesson is to design maker education initiatives with, not just for, local communities. Brooklyn College Community Partnership is a wholly grassroots organization, and in figuring out what the maker movement might mean for their educational programs, they made sure that a full range of stakeholders, especially youth, were at the table. In many ways these lessons are not new – theories of culturally relevant pedagogy, funds of knowledge, co-design and participatory design would all suggest creating learning environments in similar ways. We just need to remember to continually apply, and advance, such ideas as we explore this intersection of making and learning.….

…And we can look to examples that are rooted in the work of innovative, equity-oriented educators to see what good practice looks like so that, as Buechley says, the new boss doesn’t look the same as the old boss.

I am continuing my learning journey, making mistakes along the way. I don’t write about it much because I worry that that is all writing, no action. So this is a rare moment.

From the Archives: Scientific Research, Openness and External Validation

Image of a seine fishing net with a blurred image of a man at the end of it, weaving together broken bits and pieces.
Weaving it all together!

My face split into a grin when I read Carl Zimmer’s article, Swine Flu Science: First Wiki, Then Publish in Discover Magazine. This collective mobilization, weaving together emergent scientific findings, is what so many people in international agricultural research and other areas have been evangelizing. This is not to diminish the role of external validation – it is important. Amazingly important. But it is only one end of the spectrum of validating research and application.

First, about the Swine Flu wiki. Then I’ll circle back to external validation. From Carl’s article:

Last month I scrambled to write a story about the evolution of swine flu for the New York Times. I talked to some of the top experts on the evolution of viruses who were, at that very moment, analyzing the genetic material in samples of the virus isolated around the world. One scientist, whom I reached at home, said, “Sure, I’ve got a little time. I’m just making some coffee while my computer crunches some swine flu. What’s up?”

All of the scientists were completely open with me. They didn’t wave me off because they had to wait until their results were published in a big journal. In fact, they were open with the whole world, posting all their results in real-time on a wiki. So everyone who wanted to peruse their analysis could see how it developed as more data emerged and as they used different methods to analyze it.

Carl goes on to write about the wiki work-in-progress, the final publication in the journal Nature, and the Creative Commons license on the article – so we can all read it when it is published.

When should this be the common research pattern, instead of the exception? Carl suggests “With this sort of urgent situation at hand, the patient process of old-fashioned science publishing may have to be upgraded.” But what about important things that move slower, like international agricultural research which has at its core a mission to feed the world. Why should slower, “less sexy” science eschew the new practices of open access research? It is most often public governmental or private foundation money funding this work. In the case of public money, that is you and I, citizens of many countries. And what foundation in its right mind would want to stifle advancements that might help achieve missions?

So why isn’t this standard practice? I’m no genius, but one barrier is how research science is taught and rewarded – in any sector. The old “publish or perish.” Couple that with the competition for funding, generating a deep seated need to say “we invented it here in our institution, give us more money,” and you have the recipe for hoarding.

We are not talking about some pharma’s latest top secret moneymaking designer drug here. We are talking about research supposedly in the public interest.

So what is a facilitator to do about all of this?

First,  we can support scientists with practical and straightforward wiki collaboration tips and practices. Open up our wikis to the world. What if every talented online facilitator could be available to support any group of scientists who wanted to collaborate in their pre-publication research work.  Some organizations are clearly doing their part to support this effort, but what if we could make our little bit of magic available to help? Are we ready appropriately speak and support in the language of science, research and international development? If not, what do we need to do?

Second, we can support external validation of new ways of doing research intended for the public interest.

Time and again people ask  how to gain support for strategic learning, knowledge sharing  or social media initiatives from their leadership. They tell me they get big fat “no’s” with a laundry list of excuses. This is often true in the application of social media in scientific research.  How do we convince management, they ask? Or perhaps more relevant, how do we make a cogent case for the researchers and the institutions and how do we validate those cases?

One tactic is to muster external validation.

By external validation I mean tangible support or recognition for work done within an organization by an external voice as well as general recognition about the value of the practice in question from outside the organization. Carl’s article is an example of the latter. We should be pointing to it like crazy in research organizations. When the Nature article comes out, round two!

Getting the former can be something that emerges, or something you stimulate. Let’s look at both ends of the spectrum.

Comparing F2F and Online Idea Generation – broaden our focus!

Picture of a small person looking out of a blue car's window as seen through the side mirror, with fainter image of hands on camera taking picture through front passenger window.
How many perspectives? Foci?

Earlier this month on the KM4Dev email list, one of my colleagues pointed to a study comparing F2F and online idea generation in the journal Nature and concluding F2F produced better results.

Virtual communications curbs creative idea generation, by Melanie S. Brucks and Jonathan Levav was a fascinating read. The authors did more to test their hypothesis compared to other studies I’ve read which claim one environment or other is better for some function. I take them with the proverbial grain of salt. This one got me thinking more deeply. Here is a bit from their summary:

Departing from previous theories that focus on how oral and written technologies limit the synchronicity and extent of information exchanged4,5,6, we find that our effects are driven by differences in the physical nature of videoconferencing and in-person interactions. Specifically, using eye-gaze and recall measures, as well as latent semantic analysis, we demonstrate that videoconferencing hampers idea generation because it focuses communicators on a screen, which prompts a narrower cognitive focus. Our results suggest that virtual interaction comes with a cognitive cost for creative idea generation.

Brooks and Levav

Narrower cognitive focus! In the example studies, they talked about the power of objects around is in a physical room to help us get creative. We limit those options when we diligently focus on the screen online. Wait, we focus on the screen because that is what we have habituated as proper virtual behavior. “Focus on the screen! Avoid distractions! And then we lose a bit of ourselves. Have you ever had that experience at the end of a Zoom where you have to reground yourself in your physical space?

Broader cognitive focus! Our habits impact our participation and our results. What if it is our lack of imagination and attention to what full presence and participation means that hampers us? What if we invited ourselves to use our F2F external environment WHILE attending to the screen? What if stepping away from the screen was part of the idea generation practice which not only widened our visual cognitive focus, but reawakened our kinesthetic selves?

It is convenient to assume that environment trumps all. And thus we begin to bias our thinking about the issue of F2F vs online options and choices that are so top-of-mind these days.

Maybe we are asking the wrong questions. What if the question was “what kinds of focus most contribute to idea generation?” And THEN ask how that focus can play out across different environments. This might be a great area for experimentation!

Image of tree branches in foreground, looking across a bay to a row of factories in the pink/orange of dusk.
View from a hotel room in Cameroon

Back when there was “social” in the software…

Picture of the head of a dog (Australian shepherd?) looking at you.
Alan Levine’s blog avatar

Alan Levine noted that he is just past his blogaversary and linked to a post of his from 2006 that I just love. It is a story of how he created an artifact from a presentation I gave at NorthernVoice (a BLOGGING conference, can you IMAGINE that?? We were crazy kids back in the day!). What was magical about this story is how Alan’s recording of my talk rippled across our respective networks and how people added to it and amplified it. (Bev, I loved your notes. Still do! Nick, all these years you mashed it up and now retirement is on the horizon! Who would have guessed!) I think this is when I really became a fan of CogDog, aka, Alan.

A picture of a woman in 2006 with shoulder length curly born hair glasses, holding two bags of Dove Dark chocolates. Photo by Alan Levine.
Photo by Alan Levine of a much younger, shaggier me, sharing chocolate

Alan’s post also has me looking back at years and years of Flickr event albums. Mama mia, there are stories. I often think I have few stories to tell. My problem is simply that I just don’t practice telling them! A little nostalgia… And boy, I was a lot younger back then! And with a lot longer hair. Still sharing the same Dove Dark chocolates though!

Edit a few minutes later: I’m listening to the audio. Still relevant.

From the Archives: Reflections on the FbD Learning Series

Screen shot of four videos from Floodplains by Design's "Collaboration Campfires"

Along time ago and in a place far far away, I supported an awesome network of folks at Floodplains by Design. When the pandemic hit we did a lot of the proverbial pivoting. Network work often entails a lot of meetings and we moved everything online. We ran a series of online facilitation workshops in 2020 and in 2021 and lo and behold today I resurfaced the videos of the sessions. The 2020 series was positioned as “Virtual Coffees” and the 2021 series was called the “Collaboration Campfire!” If you are so inclined, take a stroll through the videos here: https://vimeo.com/user142408470

Here are a few of the things that stand out for me from those two years of constant pivoting.

  • A small but consistent core of community leaders are the glue that enables intermittent and even one time participation to have value.  Our co-chairs and core members provided consistency, stability and network weaving through their wonderful relationships.
  • The community core (plus guests) designs as a TEAM, not the external facilitator designing and delivering. Team design yields experiences that meet a range of needs rather than one championed by a single designer.
  • Find that balance between process and content. Content is essential for the technical floodplains work, but the social bonds between members is nurtured through process. 
  • Vary the process, but not everything, all the time. We used a lot of Liberating Structures and we would try and use a structure more than once, but not the same set or string of structures every time. This gave both comfort (familiarity) and variety. More importantly, it built capacity for folks to go back and use the process on their home turf. Or river, as it were.
  • Don’t over-pack the agenda. Oi, some day we will all integrate this learning into our practices!
  • Reflect and learn after every round. There is always room for new insights and ways of doing things. 
  • Celebrate!