Three Cheers for the Home Team

Membership has its privileges…who would have thought this experiment in e-learning would be the stimulus for an exclusive club…curious?...read on…

As faithful readers of my blog know, Canadore College’s School of Recreation and Leisure has partnered this semester with Contact North…world leaders in e-learning… to deliver a 3 hour/week course (Rec 130: Legislation and Risk Management) to 113 students.

Breaking with tradition, students decide how they will attend each class…”in person” or “online”...students also decide when they will attend… in “real time” or “future time.”

For each Rec 130 class, students are offered a menu of three attendance options:

1) Attend live class in person (in-class)

2) Attend live class online (e-class)

3) Attend in the future by playback of recorded class (r-class)

Now back to that exclusive club…since our first class approximately 22 students have consistently attended classes “online.” As strange as it may seem, a special bond is developing amongst these learners...in fact, they have even taken to referring to themselves as the “home team” (very apropos, since most of these students take the course from the comfort of their homes).

When these home team students logon for their class, they greet each other with a friendly “hi how you are doing?...not exactly a secret code…but on the other hand…many of these same students previously did not know or acknowledge each other prior to this experiment…what next...team jackets?

It is also apparent from their text messaging and their comments made during our class discussions that the “home team” is developing close friendships with one another...and are willingly to lend support and to openly share course related and non course related information…as Martha Stewart might say…that’s not a bad thing.