Aha! I have had one of those Eureka moments and now I get it! (Sometimes it takes me a while to get with the program). @courosa had it right from the beginning when he said in his first post about ETMOCC that the experience would be somewhere between a conversation and a course. What does that look like? That is our challenge and I truly believe that what we see unfolding is just that and for each of us it will mean something different.
Academics (especially those of us with roots in science) love to label things and fit them into categories while in fact the thoughtful integration of educational technology and media into our teaching and learning “practices” allows us to do things we were not able to do before and to have experiences that we are not quite sure how to “experience” let alone describe.
Let’s try to forget the categories – let’s try to forget the labels and debating whether or not this is a connectivist MOO-Course or some other kind of MOO-Course – this is not a COURSE and it is not even really what we would consider a traditional CONVERSATION. What it IS is an experience that lies somewhere between that traditional version of a course and a traditional conversation – because it is happening in a space where we usually lurk and hoard – and now we are being challenged to collaborate and curate and filter and share.
Let’s try to forget the labels – I can not help but think that those of us participating in this “experience” are truly pioneers – just as our fore fathers were pioneers in physical spaces we are pioneers in this virtual space.
Let’s pause and reflect on the definition of pioneers: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pioneer
pi·o·neer
[pahy-uh-neer] Show IPA
noun