Wednesday 31 December 2014

Social networking, ethics and exploring boundary management


Developing best practice for the small world. (Lannin and Scott, 2013)

The Lannin and Scott (2013) paper is focused on the psychology community and how to navigate social media by interpreting the APA Ethical Guide in a different context. This paper is a brilliant read and spoke to me about the personal professional context. In particular it reflecting on the opportunities and challenges that are presenting in social media, as similar to those that small rural communities face. Close contact, small worlds, means that it is very difficult to separate out personal and professional completely. The paper sees this a ‘small world ethics’, and situated the dilemmas created where younger members don’t realise there are dilemmas, but older members can’t help as they have no experience of the technology. By drawing upon experiences of navigating in small rural communities, then they could draw lessons in how to navigate in the social networking world.This resonated with Scouting communities for me. Often part of the communities becoming extended families. How do we maintain boundaries when boundaries collide? They say it is naïve of us to think that our ‘private’ lives will never intersect with our professional lives.

Social networking, like rural communities, increase the incidental contact, self-disclosure (remember we said that social media by its nature is a self-disclosure environment) and multiple relationships. Small world ethical thinking means we need to have a heightened awareness that the environment may produce some ethical dilemmas and boundary violations.  So we need to assess the risks and rewards that online activity might have, but we (talking about psychologists) may also need to be upfront and honest about the potential roles, set expectations from the start.

The paper ends by discussing the potential for good practice. This includes boundary management, technical competence and professional/personal liability. It’s a good idea to have formal social networking policies in place, so that both parties know the terms of use, expectations and what they will and won’t do, bearing in mind informed consent (e.g. – the psychologist will not search for the client online). They consider potentially avoiding multiple online relationships with clients and maybe having professional and personal profiles. They also say that psychologists should develop technical competence before engaging with social media, just as they would understand the cultural content in any work they undertake.

So this paper was interesting for many reasons but there are two takeaways for me. The guidance and advise advocated is very similar to that that I give to volunteers. Understand, develop skills, and recognise the risks. More importantly, there is a lesson here about the fact that in life, sometimes there will be boundary violations – how we manage and deal with these is important. So maybe some of the messages that need to be added in, are about what happens if you think you have crossed a line. How to you deal with that.

What is a digital persona (de Kerckhove and Almedia, 2013)

The paper identifies the core identity, the person, and then persona, which are the roles, relationships, attributes and identifiers of our person. And these aspects are persona;, social, institutional, legal, scientific and technological.    

“..society, experts, institutions and groups are still in a fragile unconscious, or pre-conscious phase, regarding the nature of the digital persona; ethical and mature management of its features and the need to develop more comprehensive, ethical and friendly self-management tools."

Once again we see that digital communication changes private individuality into networked and connected community.

When worlds collide in Cyberspace (Ollier-Malaterre and Rothbard, 2013)

The final paper I looked at picks up on the idea of boundary management, and looked at the different ways that we manage social media from the other side. How does personal information effect others professional views of us. More can be found at http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/social-media-social-minefield/ . Another fascinating read and it starts to get ‘under the bonnet’ of how interactions online can effect others perceptions of us, and our identities. The paper points out that we haven’t yet figured out how to manage our digital persona and there are no comprehensive frameworks to draw on. This is good news in some ways, as it means all those discussions I have been having at work, are still very much in their infancy.

The paper recognising that there can be a collision between professional and personal lives and social media use require boundary management and identity negotiation through the opportunities and challenges present, especially because of self-disclosure. This is about the consequences of the personal on the professional and it was good to read some of the positive effects rather than focusing on the negative!. The paper identifies four types of management behaviours: Open, audience, content, hybrid.

Boundary theory in social networking is driven by preferences for segmentation (how we divide up different aspects of our persona) versus the integration of personal and professional identities and our motives for self-enhancement or self-verification. Basically, when you come down to it, social media is all about ego, and so it focuses on what we want to tell people about us, or the identity we want to create – consciously or unconsciously). The paper also explained how the notion of boundary management came about in the 1960s where there was a clear idea that professional and personal were separate. Once again this adds some understanding in to why some of our older adults find social media so strange, as the concept of sharing personally information is not one that they grew up with. However social networking has become a key forum for developing and maintaining relationships, especially if as me, you are a relatively isolated practitioner in your context.

The danger is, that our self-disclosures online are an archive of information that is not tailored to a specific context or a particular relationship or situation, and so it’s original context and meaning can be lost. Here’s the outcome of their research:




de Kerckhove, D., & de Almeida, C. M. (2013). What is a digital persona?. Technoetic Arts: A Journal Of Speculative Research, 11(3), 277-287.

Lannin, D. G., & Scott, N. A. (2013). Social networking ethics: Developing best practices for the new small world. Professional Psychology: Research And Practice, 44(3), 135-141.


Ollier - Malaterre, A., Rothbard, N. P., & BERG, J. M. (2013). When worlds collide in cyberspace:How Boundary work in online social networks impacts professional relationships. Academy Of Management Review, 38(4), 645-669. 

Culture, Society and Identity



“..values are the primary motivational construct that influences almost every aspect of human life, guiding us to consider what is desirable then energising and directing behaviour towards attaining these goals..” (Suke, 2009)


I wanted to explore further the ideas around cultural identity and ethics, as this linked to my project premise about taking a values-based approach to digital inclusion. My assumption was that many of the discussions about identity, trust and safety are, and will continue to happen, but what we need to do is find the right ‘conversational frameworks’ with which to have these discussion. Originally I thought that I could just point people in the right direction and give them some top tips. But it has become clearer the more I have researched, that these are decisions that people have to make for themselves, but you can help them to have these conversations.

Suke (2009) paper was an interesting look at male cultural identity with students in china, and how the digital world might be changing their cultural values. Chen describes values as objects, conditions or characteristics that members of that society consider important. This is interesting in a Chinese context, as cultural values were formed from the traditional culture of china and the increasing globalised culture of the online world. Therefore these young men were interacting in two potentially different social environments and so it would be expected that this might alter their culture values.

The idea of cultural identity is also pick up in a paper by Cullen (2009), researching ideas of identity and information privacy in the context of New Zealand. Cullen notes that the concerns about privacy are different for different groups and reflect the cultural values and concepts of personal identity that people have. This difference in privacy concerns is also the basis for Lorenzen-Huber et al’s (2010) research on privacy and older aged adults. Their motivation was understanding whether privacy frameworks should be different for older aged adults, as their perceptions will be influenced by different psychosocial motivations.  They say that studies suggest that older adults are unconcerned about privacy related to data-collection and sharing and that their perceived risk is lower than the actual risk. They explored a five part privacy framework using a variety of practical experiments with older people.
  • Seclusion (right to be left alone)
  • Autonomy (right to self-determination)
  • Property (right to determine use and dissemination of personal data)
  • Spatial construct (physical and virtual boundaries)
  • Data protection

They found that older adults were more concerned with emotional connections to family and friends, but particularly focused on independence and autonomy. Therefore they balanced privacy preferences against their desire for independent living, personal autonomy and satisfying relationships, and had little concern around the five areas of privacy. If devices were perceived as useful then they generally viewed them as acceptable, but they wanted to control the decision making.

What this starts to show us is that we need to understand identity and privacy as not universal. The concerns and approaches are not only different according to culture, but also to age. Therefore discussions and work with volunteers might need to be approached differently. One size won’t fit all, and the risks to one group may be different to those of another because of their perceptions.

The digital world and youth culture.

Discussions about the fragmented self are scattered around literature about the digital world and culture. Besley (2011) reminds us of Foucault’s view that our identities are not fixed but fluid. They change and develop over time in a fluid, dynamic and creative process. As Besley is reflecting on creative media and how this contributes to the wider ‘knowledge’ economy, the paper naturally explores identity with a personal and public dimension, and how the public dimension shapes our behaviour. Besleys notes that the digital identity can be more fragmented and more temporal, so we need to manage it more, although we tend to put our best side forward. Youth culture is often situated within the online world of content creation and participatory culture (affiliations, expressions, collaborative problem solving and circulations), and much of this makes us ‘media producers’.

KImmon’s (2014) focuses in on new media and the literacies that ensue. We need to have an understanding of the relationship between online participation and identity and also how the structure of social media spaces influence and shape identity. Gradinaru talked about ‘context collapse’ in the sense that it is hard for us to figure out what context we are in, but as Belk pointed out, social media context afford certain characteristics, like more self-disclosure. Therefore, according to Kimmons social networking sites have their own cultures and norms that force us to behave in certain ways, making it difficult to express ‘authentic’ identity. It is also easier to misinterpret identity through online information as it often doesn’t go deeper into the whys and whats of what we are expressing. Therefore (back to Foucault), identity is fluid and shaped by the context of the media we participate in. Which is not a new idea, as we behave differently at work, as we might at home, and so forth.

“…we need to empower learners to participate in SNS in ways that are meaningful and truthful for them, but do not reduce identity to the strict confines of the medium”. (Kimmons, 2014)

Besley, T. (2011). Digitised youth: Constructing identities in the creative knowledge economy. Annals Of Spiru Haret University, Journalism Studies, 12(1), 9-22.
Cullen (2009) Culture, identity and information privacy in the age of digital government.  Online Information Review, 33(3), 405-421.
Lorenzen-Huber, L., Boutain, M., Camp, L. J., Shankar, K., & Connelly, K. H. (2011). Privacy, Technology, and Aging: A Proposed Framework. Ageing International, 36(2).
Kimmons, R. (2014). Social Networking Sites, Literacy, and the Authentic Identity Problem. Techtrends: Linking Research & Practice To Improve Learning, 58(2), 93-98.

Suke, C. (2009). College Male Students' Cultural Value Identity in the New Media World. China Media Research, 5(4), 41-46.

A further quest for identity


I have been continuing my exploration of identity, after some carefully worded searching on the Open University library (not sure what I am going to do without it). The next few blog posts are a summary of some of the papers that I read on my long train journey yesterday to see family.

The Extended Self in a Digital World (Belk, 2013)

Russell Belk is a professor in business and marketing and his discussion focuses on how possessions are an extended part of our identity. This paper was so fascinating that I even discussed it over lunch. It is interesting to come to discussions about identity from a different place, and his paper looks at rewriting an earlier work about possessions, and how digital possession might change how we view and create identity. The digital world means that many of our possessions are now ‘invisible’ (like music, film), and what was once private collections has now become public. The paper discusses whether that means that we no longer view possessions in the same way, or does it mean that we alter how we use and view these possessions as a wider part of our identity.

The key concept is that possessions serve as markers for others to form impressions of us, and are cues for individual and collective meaning. Belk notes that digital good can change our behaviour. They can stimulate consumer desires, and help actualise possible daydreams or impossible fantasies (by becoming a wizard in world of Warcraft or building a village), but they also serve to facilitate experimentation. However, the problem with digital possessions is the uncertainty over ownership. Belk asks if their roles change when we turn off the device, but I think this is no different from the collections you keep in the attic, or the music and films that sit on shelves.


This prompted discussion during lunch around how digital things might have change our own personal possession. We are moving house soon and have started to ‘declutter’. We have ‘got rid of’ a number of dvds (from a collection of over 500), books and cds. Several years ago I said that I would never have a kindle – now – I wouldn’t be without it. I have come to realise that my love of books wasn’t the physical object, but the places that they took me. I still feel the same emotions towards reading and treasure some of the stories, but I don’t need to keep the physical book. I love my kindle and find that a physical book constrains me being able to just pop it in my bag for those odd moments. It’s the same with music. My whole music collection fits on a disk that fits in my phone. I have listened to more music in the last year than I did the previous ten years before. Why. Because it fits in my pocket, and I can play it whenever there is a moment. My walk to work everyday has afforded a great deal of opportunity to revisit albums from my youth, and long train journeys home from training weekends, let me rest my brain and listen to new albums.  So music suddenly has been repackaged and repurposed in my life. I guess this is about the fact that possession are extended parts of us, and it’s how we use it, rather than the physical presentation of it that is important. But what digital possessions have meant for me, is that I get to explore my heritage and discover new things that will potential help me reconfigure my identity for now.

Getting back to Belk, there are a number of other points he makes, which many others also make, about the natural of the digital world. Our representations of ourselves can be fictional (online games and virtual worlds) or real-life (blogs, forums and social media). What we have started doing more of, is sharing our possessions, as a way of enhancing our sense of self: self-portraiture, self-reflection, and self-confession. I really important point that I had not really consciously considered, but is acknowledged by many of the writers about digital identity, is that less face to face contact encourages more self-disclosure. And most social networks afford self-disclosure as the heart of their existence. Belk tells us that this means there is more self-revelation (and this is acceptable, in fact a necessity) , a loss of control, more shared digital possessions and aggregated self (there’s lots of little bits of us joined together) and a shared sense of space. It means that the construction of self is more social, and focus on affirming our existence in a social world, while building an ‘extended’ self. But it also means that we start to have a more distributed memory, where the digital world gives us digital clutter, as well as different narratives of self, and digital cues to our sense of past.


Belk, R. W. (2013). Extended self in a digital world. Journal of Consumer Research, 40(3), 477-500. [online] Available at: http://www.dies.uniud.it/tl_files/utenti/crisci/Belk%202013a.pdf

Monday 29 December 2014

Exploring online identity - convergence of self


From Multitude to Convergence: Contemporary Trends in the Study of online Identity (Gradinaru, 2013)

This paper attempts to explore the changes in our understanding of identity, and how ‘technological domestication’ (the fact that the internet is a functional part of our everyday lives), has meant a convergence in the online/offline identity. Today our online identities are similar to our offline, as people want to be honest and direct, and because it would be incredibly difficult to manage multi-personalities now that it is easier for us to find ways of verifying people’s identities and that we have less control, sometimes, as a user. The information about us needs to fit together.

I remember reading a number of articles when I first started my Masters in Online and Distance Education about anonymity and identity and how the internet is changing behaviour. So this article, despite it being a difficult read, really spoke about the ways that technology use has changed and that for most people, honesty and ‘realistic’ portrayals of self are more important, especially in a networked age. Gradinaru takes us back to the early internet of the 1990s and how the multitude of possibilities and anonymity spoke to us of the freedom and liberty that the internet affords, and links in with postmodern ideas and multiple personalities.  ‘Self’ could be distributed and so we could have a portfolio of personalities and play different roles at the same time. Being able to explore numerous aspects of ourselves potentially led to tensions between our online and offline identities.

However the way we use the internet and technology itself has changed, especially with the advent of social media tools and platforms, meaning that the difficulty is now knowing which identity to us in which context (Rodogno, 2011). Or in fact knowing what context we are in. Rodogno introduces the idea of ‘content collapse’ in sense that the complexity of the platforms and services available to us make it difficult for us to determine which identity we are in, and so multiple audiences are suddenly in the same context.  Therefore as users it’s not surprising that we have started adopting a ‘imagined audience’ and lean towards shaping our online identity to that of our offline. Otherwise we have a great deal of work to do in ‘archiving’ and protecting our different personalities.

Online identity then, is about how we present ourselves to others, but also about how we perceive ourselves through our interaction with others. This the way we present ourselves online becomes a process of managing and constructing impressions, so that we can control how other perceives us. Therefore the internet is no longer a playground with which to construct different identities (although we still use the internet to explore different facets of identity), it becomes a way of ‘customising’ our identities, with symbolic markers that link back to the ‘real’.


How is this relevant to my project?
Many of our volunteers will be of a generation who lived through these debates in the 1990s, and may see the internet still as this ‘other’ place where people go to play and be someone or something they are not. The article reminds us that the way we use technology has changed. The more embedded it has become, the more people use it as a part of their everyday lives, and so their online identities will mirror the offline. That’s not to say that there aren’t people who create completing anonymous identities, and we know that some of the fears about safety come from the fear of not knowing who you are talking to. But it has become easier to verify identity. Because people are being ‘real’.
Thus if we want to help our volunteers with their trust issues, we can once again draw on our values. The way we behave and act offline should be the same as the way we behave online. The way we interact with strangers, should be the same. Just as we might be wary of the stranger on the bus, we should also be wary of the stranger wanting to be our friend on Facebook. Being ‘real’ about our identity makes it easier to manage our identity.

Gradinaru, C. (2013). From Multitude to Convergence: Contemporary Trends in the Study of Online Identity. Argumentum: Journal The Seminar Of Discursive Logic, Argumentation Theory & Rhetoric, 11(2), 95-108.

Rodogno, R. (2011). “Personal Identity Online”. Philosophy and Technology 25 (3): 309-328.

Binge studying......

A lovely picture of a squirrel to represent me binging, but also to provide some cute factor by way of an apology.

So we have had binge eating. Then binge entertainment (where you what the whole series in one day). As you know, I like to 'binge' study. This is through necessity rather than choice really. That's what time resources do. 

According to the urban dictionary binge studying is about cramming for a test, and is not useful. However, my binge studying is more about utilising my resources within a temporal context (time). I am breaking up study time by looking at forums, twitter and other students work.
So sorry, but I guess if you are binging - it's better to share it right?

Part two: exploring concept of digital inclusion



Social and Digital disadvantage (Helsper, 2008)

Helsper’s (2008) study explored the relationship between social and digital disadvantage using available empirical data. It is a comprehensive look at the links between digital and social engagement and focuses on the debates around socio-economic links to digital inclusion. The study picks up on the question about use – and asks does it matter that many households don’t use the internet?

Key findings
The report found that those in socially deprived areas were also least likely to have access to digital resources, and the analysis suggested that this had not been improving. However it points out that there are clear exceptions from the norm. These included the ‘unexpectedly engaged’, who tended to be younger, single, socially disadvantaged and certain ethnic groups. It also included the ‘unexpectedly disengaged’, who were those in more rural areas, older and unemployed.  The analysis highlighted that educational achievement, employment and rural access could affect engagement, but this was not necessarily because of access or skill. There were links found with the level at which people accessed technology and social isolation and economic disadvantage. Those who suffer specific social disadvantages were least likely to benefit from technology that could potentially help them (for example, those with poor education faced barriers to access education, the elderly faced a reduction in the likelihood of using social application).

Digital choice
Helsper introduces the idea of ‘digital choice’. This concept, I think, encapsulates the idea that just because you can go online, you do. Online initiatives that focus purely on access and digital services, forget about the support factors that are needed for social inclusion, which may help with engagement with technology. Attitude to technology are just as important as access quality and the access location.

This picks up on some of the categories that the Tinder foundation have highlighted:
Digitally Excluded – perceive they have no access
Digitally Dismissive – choose not to use, but have access and skills
Digitally Included – have the desire, access and skills
Digitally Determined – have the access but it is not readily available

Digital choice is driven by cultural factors and social context. This means that individuals may have positive and negative attitudes and we need to tackle these attitudes and cultural barriers. This report in particular highlights that despite discussions around inclusion, the potential for the internet to address social isolation and economic disadvantage are largely untapped, because the focus has been on the barriers and have not included the enablers. There is a need to address ‘digital choice’ as well as ‘digital divides’. Digital disengagement is a complex problem and there are social, cultural and attitudinal factors that inform digital choice.

Beyond the digital divide (Selwyn and Facer, 2007)

This report from Future lab, brings us back into the sphere of education, and focuses on the more traditional approach to ‘digital divides’ and the uptake of digital technology. This puts inclusion back in to the realms of ability; “All members of society are able to access the affordances created and offered by technology use”; and focuses on the debates around digital literacies, which is the area of the report that is of most interest here. However it’s worth noting that the authors remind us that access is not just a bout broadband, but also about wireless and satellite connectivity.

The report states that skills are not limited to basic physical actions like keyboard skills but also to those which have technical and social qualities.  We need both a basic literacy, that is the ability to read and write; and a ‘functional’ literacy, the ability to put our skills in to use.  The report develops three core areas of literacy:
  •  Information literacy – to be able to discern the quality of content
  • Adaptive literacy – to be able to develop new skills whilst using ICT 
  • Occupational literacy – to apply skills in a business, education or domestic environment.

  
Definitions of digital inclusion

INCLUSION – DIVIDE – CHOICES - PARTICIPATION

So where does that take us on our analysis and development of the concept of digital inclusion? Clearly inclusion is a complex area, and, going back to what we said at the start, it is not just about access or about skills. People need to decide whether using technology is meaningful in their lives, but we also need to remember that inclusion is not just about deficits and barriers but also about opportunities, outcomes and practices. These reports highlight the conversations that continue to take place at a government and education level. There are barriers, access is important, people need the skills and there are technology and social issues to address.


We need to localise these conversations, so that we truly understand the cultural and social enablers.  I have already written my thoughts on inclusion with my own context and that of the project, linking back to the ideas of openness. For me it’s about participation, and empowering people (giving them the motivation and belief in themselves), to participate online. It’s not about the financial or economic benefits to the individual, but about the wider societal impact of participating in the world with others. This takes me back to how I think that self-efficacy links to empowerment. 

Seale (2009) reminded us that people bring their own set of motivations, skills and resourcefulness to the online world, and my hope is that by highlighting the skills and resourcefulness, as well as the values that people share in my context, we can encourage participation and inclusion.

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Helsper, Ellen (2008) Digital inclusion: an analysis of social disadvantage and the information society. Department for Communities and Local Government, London, UK. [online] Available at: http://www.esd.org.uk/esdtoolkit/communities/DigitalInclusion/tools%5COXiS%20Report.pdf

Seale, J. (2009). Digital Inclusion. A research briefing by the technology enhanced learning phase of the teaching and learning research programme. [online] Available at: http://www.tlrp.org/docs/DigitalInclusion.pdf

Selwyn, N., & Facer, K. (2007). Beyond the digital divide. Opening Education Reports. Bristol: Futurelab. Retrieved October24, 2007. [online]. Available at: http://www2.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/opening_education/Digital_Divide.pdf

Digital inclusion - what does it mean?

For the first part of my project I have been exploring digital inclusion and what it really means. Like most ‘concepts’, there is a lack of clarity around definition. This puts it in danger of becoming another meaningless concept that is bandied about. So what have I found?

Economic and political motivations

The UK Government defines digital inclusion as ‘having the right access, skills, motivation and trust to confidently go online’ (Cabinet Office, 2014). They want us to be digitally capable of going online and using it to improve our lives. However the government’s motivations stem from creating opportunities and ensuring that we have the competencies needed to develop the economy. This is evident from that fact that many of the projects that have arisen from the Digital Strategy have focused on access and skills ( see Go ON UK ). While large companies are working alongside the government to ensure we have the infrastructure to deliver platforms and services, Go-ON UK are working with partners to make sure that adults have the basic digital skills needed. And there are some fantastic projects being delivered, many of which are focusing on those who are deemed to be excluded (socio-economic areas of older demographics).

 In fact even Europe has a digital strategy to ‘help digital technologies, including the internet, deliver sustainable economic growth’. Once again this focuses on access and skills, although there is also mention of cyber-security. However this focus on access and skills, has a hint of technological determinism (technology will make the world a better place) about it. It divides people into the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’, focusing on access and skills. Skills and access are not the only things that influence decision about whether people find using technology appropriate or meaningful in their lives.

Motivation to go online

The government strategy highlights ‘motivation’ and ‘trust’ as elements of their digital strategy, and say that overcoming the barriers is about all of them, but there seems to be little in depth discussion around the motivation and trust barriers. The motivation seems to be that being able to go online will make it easier to find a job, to improve household income, to get more benefits from public services and entertainment. But I wonder whether these motivations are too ‘capitalist’ in their approach. In other words, they are appealing to people economically and financially, rather than socially and culturally. Motivation is about the relevance to the individual, and the triggers will be different for different people. There cannot be a one size fits all approach.

Digital Inclusion (Seale, 2009)

Seale’s (2009) report is an update about the research being conducted around digital inclusion, and what wider discussions can bring to the development of technology enhanced learning. She highlights in the opening that definitions of digital inclusion

 ‘tend to embed within them an expectation or imperative that digital inclusion happens when all members of society are able to access the affordances offered by technology use ‘(page 3)

The report focuses on four aspects: Access, Use, Participation and Empowerment. Access, as is seen by the Government’s digital strategy links to technologies and services (direct access is seen as being able to access technology and indirect access is about accessing online services). Use, is highlighted as mainly being about the skills that individuals have to use technology. However, Seale notes that it is not just a lack of skills that influences technology use. Technology must have some meaningful use in people’s lives and afford contextual uses; in other words, does it have a ‘life-fit’. Seale also asks us whether non-use of technology is problematic. This is an important question, which later papers will explore.

Traditionally, ‘inclusion’ is focused on helping people to participate in society. Therefore digital inclusion is about helping to reduce the disadvantaged, and encourage participation for the marginalised. (see the Helsper paper on my next blog post for the link between social and digital exclusion).  Seale draws our attention to Cook and Light (2006) who explore participation and see it as a fluid process and make a distinction between active (we influence the way technology is used) and passive  (recipients of the service) participation. This leads on to the final aspect, empowerment. You see power comes up a lot in discussions about the online world, but also in discussions about inclusion. Seale highlights that the government see technology as a vehicle for empowerment, and link this to the idea of independence. Seale issues some sensible warnings about linking empowerment to independence and self-sufficiency, as it leads us to link digital inclusion with skills deficits, forgetting that people have a whole host of other ‘strengths, motivations and resourcefulness’ to bring with them. Personally I would rather use the term self-efficacy, that is, an individual believes in their own ability, which is what I think empowerment is all about rather than independence.

The key point that Seale is making is that digital inclusion is multi-faceted. It is a social, cultural and cognitive concepts, and so we must define and redefine for our own contexts while recognising the wider discussions that are going on. If we think about inclusion in terms of access, then we consider how equality of opportunity can benefit. If we think about inclusion in terms of use and empowerment, then we are prompted to think about the equality of the outcomes not just the opportunities.


For my next blog post I will be exploring the concept of digital inclusion some more, and looking at how this links to social disadvantage, participation, and whether we need to change how we look at this, and consider whether digital choice is a good thing.

Cabinet Office (2014) Government Digital Inclusion Strategy, 13 April 2014 [online] Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/government-digital-inclusion-strategy

Cook, J & Light, A. (2006) New patterns of power and participation? Designing ICT for Informal and Personalised Flexible Community Learning. E-Learning, 3, 1, 51-61.

Seale, J. (2009). Digital Inclusion. A research briefing by the technology enhanced learning phase of the teaching and learning research programme. [online] Available at: http://www.tlrp.org/docs/DigitalInclusion.pdf

Sunday 28 December 2014

Project poster version 2: for review


Following peer review and a bit of tinkering, here is version two of the project poster.

The purpose?
The poster is designed to be an 'advertisement' for my presentation at the online conference for my H818 module (Networked practitioner). You can read about the project in some of my earlier posts, but particularly here

As part of my project I am creating a multimedia website that contains information and guidance for volunteers, based on my assumption that adopting a values-based approach to digital participation, might help remove some of the barriers to going online. The website will explore digital inclusion, and the barriers defined by the government

At the conference I will be talking about my topic and theme (digital inclusion and removing the barriers) and presenting the website as my 'multimedia artifact'.

Therefore the poster should act as a way to 'hook' people into my presentation, giving enough information for it to make sense but leaving some room for presenting my findings and approach.  I believe that the video should also work as a standalone for the website as well, possibly with a few changes.

For review
So, I have been asking my fellow students to review, but as this is all about being 'networked' I also thought I would spread my wings wider. I know that there are still elements that I need to tinker with.
Can you help?
If you saw this, would you want to know more, or come to the conference presentation?

Do you think it makes sense?
Should I loose the pictures where there is no text?
Is there enough time to read it? Or is it too slow? Too long?
Are any of the pictures out of place (as visuals can be a personal thing)?
Is the project and the outcome explicit enough?

Please watch my film and comment below, or pop me an email
All help muchly appreciated.

Deck the halls - Creating a multi-media poster.

Merry Christmas one and all, and although the last month has flown by, some of us are back in the swing of things and studying hard (after all there is an assignment deadline waiting in the wings). 

December has been about creating a multimedia poster in H818, in order to 'advertise' our presentation at the online conference which will be happening in February. So we have all been experimenting with different media and trying to figure out which one to use. (My next post will include my beta version!).

Challenge 1: what is a poster?
This was the first hurdle for many of us, as when you think 'poster', the concept of a physical, graphical presentation spring to mind (like the ones that you stuck all over your wall as teenager, only more educational). any of the tools tried out helped to present this more one dimensional approach. However, the guidance we were given was that it had to be 'multi-media. which means it needs to be raised from one dimensional, to at least two!

Challenge 2: Multimedia tools
Thus began the trek into the forbidden kingdom and an exploration of the tools and variety of format that one could choose to make a poster out of. For many of the tools, the companies like to suck you in with freebies, but if you want to make them available to others then you need pay up. The other thing is that you can spend 'HOURS' online creating new things, so you have to start getting selective.

One of the first things I tried was Toon doo, which wasn't really a multi-media tool, but I loved the cartoon strip that you could create. Hours of fun! You can even produce your own comic, and the graphics looks great.

dig trial 1














I will be using this tool again in the future, and possibly using some of it for my final artifact. 


My poster
Following on from this I found Glogster. This is an amazing (american) site, where the tools can be used by students to create their own educational posters. There are hundreds of them to look at. I do wonder if anyone really using them as content or whether the emphasis is on the creation. This is a great way to get kids to be creative, and I wish I had this when I was doing my homework 30 years ago!  Anyway, this was a tool that had a great poster layout allowing for embedding video and audio content. I created a really rough draft to decide whether this would be the approach that I might use. The great thing about Glogster is that it also works on mobile devices. I ended up signing up to the service, as I will be using this tool in the future as a great way to get information together in one place.

So far this was the contender for the poster......

...then I came back to animation. I don't know why, by I like animation and so it was great to explore some different formats.

Firstly there was Moovly. I like the tool because it was a bit like the video and audio editors you get, although the characters and pictures were a little limited (I expect like most tools, you get more if you pay). This was very addictive! It allowed you to create a more classic version of the animated films you see a lot nowadays. I really liked it and could see some potential for creating both the poster and the artifact.

 

Then there was animoto. I am afraid this was the approach that I fell in love with! I have used some similar slideshow animations before, and I like the combination of text, images and music. I can't tell you why, but I think it's to do with the richness and also the emotive nature of the medium. 



So I asked what people preferred... I was still potentially leaning towards the moovly animation, but after talking to volunteers, a number of them preferred the immediacy of the animoto animation. Animoto however is REALLY expensive if you want to remove the watermark and get the video. And it's a great tool so I can see why it would be.

Challenge 3: Accessibility
As several people pointed out, the challenge with a full on multimedia approach is that it is not very accessible for those with impaired sight. We also talked about how some people like this multimedia approach and other's didn't. So my challenge was to consider whether to use the tool that I really wanted, and create accessible alternatives, or whether to use a different tool. 

Because I had created my storyboard using a slide show, I decided to explore other tools that I could use. Also, by using a slideshow, I could potentially create an accessible alternative that people could click through themselves and a transcript. I like this idea, as I have never tried writing audio descripton's before, so it seemed a good time to try!

Final tool - Wondershare slideshow creator
Not a free tool, but as it's Christmas I decided to treat myself.
The first version for review is below, but jump to the next blog post to see the second version which expands on this.

Monday 1 December 2014

Digital inclusion - why participation is important

Much of the debate around open education has focused on formal education, but education is not limited to formal approaches. For many youth organisations and charities, education is about helping young people build confidence and life-long skills. This participatory approach to education means the ‘digital-inclusion’ of adults is less about accessibility of educational content and more about participation in online practices and engaging with young people in the online world. 

This post is an edited version of my paper written to explore the principles of digital openness, how these could align to organisational approaches. The debates here form the backdrop to my project for H818, and outline my beliefs about inclusion in the open landscape. It asks why barriers exist and whether inclusion really matters in our context.
Cameron Gray 'The Journey Begins' http://parablevisions.com/?page_id=2338

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Defining education
The Scout Association defines education as ‘a life-long process which enables the continuous development of a person’s capacities both as an individual and as a member of society’ (World Scout Bureau, 1998, page 7). We are a non-formal educational movement where young people and adults work in partnership, learning by doing through a structured framework of activities and experiences. 

The pedagogical approach is comparable, in my opinion, to social constructivism, in which individuals learn through their interaction with others and the world around them (Palinscar, 1998, Vygotsky 1978).  It also reminds me of John Seely Brown’s notion of ‘social learning’ , as it suggests that we define ourselves by the societies we belong to (Brown and Adler, 2008). Learning is about participation (with others and the world) and therefore we ‘learn to be’ as well as learn about ‘things’. Consequently ‘how’ we learn is just as important as ‘what’ we learn as we are constructing our identity through our community interactions (Hager andHodkinson, 2009). This is important when considering the digital openness of non-formal education, as the barriers are not just ‘what’ can be accessed, but also ‘how’ to participate in the online world.

So ‘education’ from a Scouting perspective is essentially about personal development and ‘learning to be’, within a values-based community, supported by adults working alongside young people. Therefore it is not just about subject matter expertise or specific skills and knowledge, but about life-long personal skills, developing confidence and engaging with the world in a positive way. ‘Education’ is non-formal, and manifests as an approach to life realised through participation.

Digital openness and open education
Open education is loosely defined by the Open Education Working Group (2014) as ‘any practices and activities that have openness and education at their core’ (page 8). Veletsianos (2010) notes that educators can shape or be shaped by openness. But openness means different things to different people. Defining openness, within a digital context, is important if we are to be shaped by it. The Oxford English Dictionary (2004) defines ‘open’ as not being closed, or as accessible or available. Thus digital openness could means making things available using digital technologies. The debates around open education mainly focus on formal education, and they converge around discussions about availability and talk about open access, open content and open resources (McAndrew, 2010).

Our definition of education however, is grounded in participation, and Weller (2011) reminds us that openness is not just about what technology can do for us, but also about our practices as scholars or educators. Networked participation is one of the three formats of open practices described by Veletsianosand Kimmons (2012) who highlight the importance of having and maintaining a digital presence. Developments in ‘social’ technology, tools like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, have also created a new emphasis on participation (Jenkinset al, 2005). 

Accordingly, if the definition of education is ‘learning to be’ and personal development happens through participation, then open education is surely about finding the opportunities to do this within the online world. 

So digital openness in this context, refers to exploring and being open to new, participative experiences in the online world. As a result, open education is not just about making educational content freely available to all (although there is plenty of educational content available to adults and young people) but about digital participation. At a very basic level this means that adults supporting young people in Scouting should be participating and interacting with young people online.

Barriers to online participation and digital inclusion
The UK Government defines digital inclusion as ‘having the right access, skills, motivation and trust to confidently go online’ (Cabinet Office, 2014). Discussions about the barriers to inclusion can fall neatly into the three categories of availability, accessibility and acceptability (Lane, 2009). 

Availability looks at the physical access to the online world, and considers economics (whether people can afford technology) and connectivity (the infrastructure, like broadband, that allows people to access the internet). Accessibility concentrates on usability barriers, that is the skills and the ease by which people can use the internet. Debates about digital literacy dominate this area, as well as discussion about accessibility of content or software for those who have disabilities or alternative needs. 

A lack of digital skills and the means to access the online world are not necessarily the only, or the biggest barrier that people face. The third category of digital inclusion barriers come under ‘acceptability’ and this relates to social empowerment, or having the motivation and confidence to go online. The Cabinet Office’s (2014) research found that 62% of people said that the most important reason for not being online was that they were ‘not interested’. Their lack of interest may be the result of many different factors. Some people see the online world as irrelevant for them, and thus it needs to be made relevant if they are to be motivated to participate. Others are dissuaded from participation because of their fears of the online world. This could be a fear of crime, attack, or a fear of venturing into the unknown and exposing themselves or their identities. Participation means vulnerability, and individuals need to be given the confidence to overcome this. 

Digital exclusion may arise through a combination of factors and each digitally excluded person will have their own reasons and set of circumstances (Lane, 2009). Digital inclusion is about overcoming all of these challenges (access, skills, motivation, and trust) and not just one. But does digital inclusion matter for adults in The Scout Association?

Does inclusion matter?
The simple answer is yes. If education is a life-long process of development as an individual and as a part of society then adults as well as young people should be participating and interacting online. However there are challenges to overcome in assisting online participation. 

Adults and young people within the organisation can help to remove the skills barrier, sharing and developing the digital literacies others need for online participation, just as they would when developing skills like hillwalking or archery. The purpose and method of Scouting are about engaging with the world in a positive way. The online world is a part of the world and therefore it has to be relevant for adults to participate within it. If adults are to be role-models and support young people where they are, then the values of Scouting should override any motivational barriers to digital inclusion, although adults in Scouting may need to be reminded of this. 

The largest barrier to overcome is trust. This will need both education and a focus on values. There are practical ways of overcoming security and privacy fears, but adults also need to address concerns about identity and openness. This must include practical ways of talking about how values should guide online identity and activities. It also includes understanding that openness is not an ‘all or nothing’ approach and so that volunteers can explore the online world with confidence and develop their own openness. It is also about helping adults to take the skills they already have, for example: identifying and mitigating risk, planning tasks and activities and developing codes of behaviour; and apply them in the online context.

Open practices, or digital openness, is really about seeking out new experiences and participating in new ways through the online world. Just as in the 'offline' world, there can be tensions between the principals and the practicalities (Lane, 2009) which we need to help adults explore and manage. 

Adults in Scouting do amazing things with young people every day, and whether they are climbing a mountain or using social media they should use the values and methods of scouting to understand that the online world is just another ‘undiscovered’ world of opportunity. Thus they can be part of the ‘open landscape’, exhibiting their values, being appropriate role-models and effective 'digital' citizens working in partnership with young people.


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Brown, J.S. & Adler, R.P. (2008). Minds on fire: Open education, the long tail, and Learning 2.0. EDUCAUSE Review, 43(1), pp.16-32
Cabinet Office (2014) Government Digital Inclusion Strategy, 13 April 2014
Hager, P. and Hodkinson, P. (2009) ‘Moving beyond the metaphor of transfer of learning’, British Educational Research Journal, 35 (4), pp.619–38
Jenkins, H., et al. (2005) Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century, MacArthur Foundation.
Lane, Andy (2009). The impact of openness on bridging educational digital divides. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 10(5), pp. 1–12.
McAndrew, Patrick (2010). Defining openness: updating the concept of “open” for a connected world. Journal of Interactive Media in Education, 2010(10), pp.1–13.
Oxford English Dictionary (2004) ‘Open’, Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press
Palincsar, A.S. (1998). Social constructivist perspectives on teaching and learning. Annual Review of Psychology, 49, pp.345–375.
Veletsianos, G. (2010). A definition of emerging technologies for education. In G. Veletsianos (Ed.),Emerging technologies in distance education (pp. 3-22). Edmonton, AB: Athabasca University Press.
Veletsianos, G. and Kimmons, R. (2012) Assumptions and challenges of open scholarship. The International Review Of Research In Open And Distance Learning, 13 (4) pp.166–189  
Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society. London: Harvard University Press.
Weller, M. (2011). The digital scholar: How technology is transforming scholarly practice. A&C Black.
Open Education Working Group (2014) The Open Education Handbook.
World Scout Bureau (1998) Scouting: An Educational System. World Scout Bureau. Switzerland.