Teaching and plans that spring from it

[mizarchivist]

So, it's the middle of my 3rd week of teaching an online class.
I do not LOVE it. The formatting is what gets me. Without the live face time, I'm constantly in a state of self-doubt as to if my material is reaching them. After 20 days, I'm settling into not ever really knowing most of the time, but that doesn't mean I prefer this mode.
Theoretically, I teach a half day live workshop on the 1st. I only have one signed up- I need to get to 5. It's on a topic I did in the fall, so it's reasonably low stress for what it is. But if there's not enough people, I don't get paid. I like the getting paid part.

One of the off-shoots of my current class is that I've put out feelers to members of the archive community to find other solo professionals (alone in the stacks entirely or alone in the department). The isolation of solo work really does wear on you and having some option of discussion day-to-day stuff/big stuff/share observations- It's a good thing. So, some discussion group. It needs to be free and easy to use for multiple participants adding content.

My options

Email listserv- Possible interface: Yahoo! groups.
Ability to have emails in digest form
Turn around time is good- people get an email and can respond immediately
However...
Can be very overwhelming in content- perhaps too many emails in a day/week or too much traffic on content that doesn't interest.
Less option for other community building (bios, resource pages)

Discussion Board- Possible interface? No idea.
I personally find chat boards/bulletin boards with multiple topics with posts and replies within each category/topic to be a bit overwhelming. It's easy to lose new content.

Blog Community- Possible interface- multiple. I know LJ best, but there's many others, I'm sure
I like this option best so far, although I'm overwhelmed by options
The linear posting means that there's less initial content lost.
You can read/skim an entry and comment if you're so inclined- or ignore it if it's not for you
Option of having a bio page and reducing the anonymity of the group. When isolation is one of the biggest factors, finding ways to humanize- putting real faces to the people you're talking to means a lot.
Possibility of linking to other resources seem decent, although I've not figured it out entirely.

Moodle- I am not certain where that fits in. I've heard of it in the collegiate environment. I'd need to poke around to see if I could make it

So- yeah. That's what I have so far. Obviously I'm interested in putting a bit of thought and logic into the structure I wish to see built. I welcome observations.

Comments

[lifecollage.livejournal.com]

Timing is everything -- I was just thinking this morning that I should email you and ask how the teaching was going. Sorry to hear that the education-style isn't quite what you'd hoped it would be, but perhaps the next time you might want to build in some feedback points earlier in the process? The length of the course may also be a factor here -- not enough time to develop a long-distance relationship, as it t'were.

On the solo librarian discussion group: ning.com is another interests-based community site that might suit your needs. I haven't played with it too much myself, but I've seen a few library communities pop up over there. I'll poke around and see if I find anything else that might suit.

[mizarchivist]

cool. Just the sort of links I need. I'm meeting with a fellow "LA" who's down on Boylston St. on Friday afternoon to look into the architecture of this plan. Woot!!

[drwex]

I am fond of Google groups over yahoo groups. Google ads are much less obtrusive, imo.

If you want more people to contribute more stuff, consider a wiki?

[mizarchivist]

wikis do not allow for discussion boards, which is at the top of my pyramid. Wikis are a piece of piss to add in as needed.

[drwex]

Ah, perhaps I misunderstood what you meant by "discussion." When I go to Wikipedia (or other wikis) I see at the top of each page a 'discussion' tab that permits participants to add to a discussion(?) about the material. It doesn't have traditional conversational threading, which is perhaps what you want?

(I'm amused that you have a Locutus icon for talking about 'discussions'.)

[mizarchivist]

Locutus for add-ons!
and discussions.

I want something that is easily understood and used by people less tech-savvy/interested than the people you (or I) voluntarily associate with.

Wikis are good for data sharing/adding/storage, but not a format I'd ever have chosen for on-going conversations. At least not for this crowd.