On being a pioneer

[Anne Fox]

In addition to preparing to moderate one of the EVOnline sessions in January and helping to finalise the tasks for the new Trinity College validated Cert ICT with The Consultants-E I have also signed up as a participant of the MUVEnation course to explore virtual worlds in education. The first task is to write a blog entry on three possible topics. I have chosen to start with the pioneer topic. The wording is as follows:

Do you see yourself as a pioneer? Do you think you are more innovative than others in your organisation? Do you think your organisation is lagging behind? Tell us how you feel about this?

I do not see myself as a pioneer but I know that others in my organisation do. I see myself simply as someone who is willing to take advantage of the new possibilities made available by the technology. I am not a great risk taker and yet I know that others see me in that light. A very banal example was about four years ago when I was exploring with an adult student the possibility of buying a book on Amazon rather than her ordering it in a Danish book shop. I wanted to know what the final price would be to her including all taxes and postage so I clicked on 'Buy' and she just shrieked in fright because she had not understood that this was not a firm commitment to buy yet.

My organisation consists of a constellation of smaller organisations and we are not used to thinking of ourselves as an entity although that view is being promoted by the management as a survival mechanism. I am therefore used to thinking of my own small part of the organisation as my sphere of influence and we are so diverse here that it is difficult to transfer the way I use ICT in language learning to the other disciplines in my small centre. We have for example a small team of management trainers who take people out in the woods for experiential exercises and they see very little potential in ICT to support their courses even though I can see potential for pre and post course activity.

I have not been very good at dissemination and this may contribute to my image as a pioneer! However whenever anybody shows an interest I help willingly so there are some blog users in the centre and other teachers have used online meetings for example.

In some ways I do feel that our organisation is falling behind but then again I do feel that the role of language is overlooked. Most of the ICT tools we get excited about originate in English speaking countries or are presented in English first. Translations are always low on the list of priorities and I notice that these days translation is the user's responsibility anyway using the power of collective voluntary activity. It may be surprising to find language mentioned as a barrier in a Scandinavian country where 'everybody speaks English' anyway but in fact I have noted many times irritation that an extra layer of complexity to adoption of these tools is that you have to use a language which is not your mother tongue. So that may be a big part of why I am the pioneer in this area in my organisation, because English sources of information are my first port of call.

I am actually tired of being called a pioneer because I don't think that I am one at all. What I mainly do is copy other people's ideas and adapt them to my own situation. I would love to be able to work with colleagues on better and more effective implementation of ICT because I am sure that with more people on the case we could come up with some stunningly effective learning activities instead of just relying on my own resources. Therefore I do not think that I more innovative than my colleagues.