WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.040 Welcome back to the deep dive. We're really glad 00:00:02.040 --> 00:00:04.120 you're here with us. Yeah, good to be back. So 00:00:04.120 --> 00:00:06.519 today we are going to pull apart a reality that 00:00:06.519 --> 00:00:09.160 pretty much defines the modern human experience. 00:00:09.179 --> 00:00:11.179 I'm talking about the digital classroom. And 00:00:11.179 --> 00:00:13.500 not just for university students logging into, 00:00:13.500 --> 00:00:15.519 you know, Canvas or Blackboard. No, no, it's 00:00:15.519 --> 00:00:17.260 much broader. Oh, absolutely. If you're doing 00:00:17.260 --> 00:00:19.280 corporate compliance training, you're a student. 00:00:19.519 --> 00:00:21.480 If you're on a subreddit trying to figure out 00:00:21.480 --> 00:00:24.780 how to bake sourdough, you're a student. Or a 00:00:24.780 --> 00:00:26.480 Slack channel trying to get your team to agree 00:00:26.480 --> 00:00:28.839 on something. You're effectively in an online 00:00:28.839 --> 00:00:31.539 classroom. Exactly. And we're all learning in 00:00:31.539 --> 00:00:34.439 these digital boxes. But here's the friction 00:00:34.439 --> 00:00:36.960 point, and it's the specific reason we wanted 00:00:36.960 --> 00:00:40.520 to cover this. Why do some of these online spaces 00:00:40.520 --> 00:00:45.179 feel so, so vibrant? Like you're actually connecting 00:00:45.179 --> 00:00:48.000 and your brain is firing on all cylinders, while 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:49.700 others just feel like you're shouting into a 00:00:49.700 --> 00:00:52.479 void. And worse that, that tick the box fatigue. 00:00:53.039 --> 00:00:56.020 You log in, post your mandatory two sentences, 00:00:56.659 --> 00:00:59.780 log out. and you feel absolutely nothing. Right. 00:00:59.820 --> 00:01:02.780 It feels transactional. It feels dead. So to 00:01:02.780 --> 00:01:05.599 figure out why that happens and maybe how to 00:01:05.599 --> 00:01:07.540 fix it, we're looking at a really insightful 00:01:07.540 --> 00:01:09.760 article today. Yeah, this one's great. It's titled 00:01:09.760 --> 00:01:12.920 Interaction in Online Classrooms. It's by Gary 00:01:12.920 --> 00:01:15.500 Ackerman, published on hackscience .education 00:01:15.500 --> 00:01:18.219 just this January. And what really stands out 00:01:18.219 --> 00:01:20.319 about Ackerman's work here is that he's not trying 00:01:20.319 --> 00:01:22.879 to sell us on a specific piece of software. He 00:01:22.879 --> 00:01:26.510 isn't arguing that You know, Zoom is better than 00:01:26.510 --> 00:01:28.769 Teams or something. Right, it's not a product 00:01:28.769 --> 00:01:31.409 review. No, he's looking at the architecture 00:01:31.409 --> 00:01:33.510 of interaction. Architecture, yeah, that's a 00:01:33.510 --> 00:01:36.170 good word for it. It's the perfect word. He breaks 00:01:36.170 --> 00:01:38.950 down five distinct models, discussion boards, 00:01:39.129 --> 00:01:42.370 blogs, wikis, chat, and video, and he argues 00:01:42.370 --> 00:01:45.290 that the tool you choose fundamentally dictates 00:01:45.290 --> 00:01:47.890 the human behavior you get. So that's our mission 00:01:47.890 --> 00:01:49.609 today. We're going to unpack those five models. 00:01:49.670 --> 00:01:51.450 We want to understand the psychology behind them. 00:01:51.989 --> 00:01:54.390 Why does one tool make us ramble and another 00:01:54.390 --> 00:01:57.269 force us to really reflect? Precisely. Because 00:01:57.269 --> 00:02:00.290 if you understand the tool, you can stop blaming 00:02:00.290 --> 00:02:02.829 yourself for bad interactions. It's like if you 00:02:02.829 --> 00:02:04.750 walk into a cathedral, you whisper. If you walk 00:02:04.750 --> 00:02:07.530 into a bar, you shout. Ackerman is showing us 00:02:07.530 --> 00:02:09.949 the digital blueprints that cause those behaviors. 00:02:10.189 --> 00:02:12.250 OK, so let's start with the grandfather of online 00:02:12.250 --> 00:02:15.789 interaction. The tool that Ackerman calls the 00:02:15.789 --> 00:02:18.370 most common, and frankly the one I think causes 00:02:18.370 --> 00:02:22.509 the most. Collective eye rolling. Uh -huh. The 00:02:22.509 --> 00:02:24.469 discussion board. The discussion board. The ubiquitous 00:02:24.469 --> 00:02:26.789 discussion board. It's the default setting for 00:02:26.789 --> 00:02:29.990 almost every online course or forum in existence. 00:02:30.270 --> 00:02:33.889 On paper, the mechanism seems fine. Logical even. 00:02:34.449 --> 00:02:37.409 The instructor posts a prompt, I create a post, 00:02:37.530 --> 00:02:39.849 you reply to me, we get a thread. It's supposed 00:02:39.849 --> 00:02:42.759 to mimic a conversation. Supposed to. But Ackerman 00:02:42.759 --> 00:02:45.840 identifies a very specific flaw in this. A trap, 00:02:45.840 --> 00:02:48.500 he calls it. The trap of divergence. Exactly. 00:02:48.759 --> 00:02:51.340 This is the crucial insight. He points out that 00:02:51.340 --> 00:02:53.340 while discussion boards are familiar and easy, 00:02:53.560 --> 00:02:55.699 that thread structure almost guarantees that 00:02:55.699 --> 00:02:58.340 the focus will shift away from the original topic. 00:02:58.759 --> 00:03:00.319 OK, I want to push on that a bit because isn't 00:03:00.319 --> 00:03:02.819 the conversation supposed to flow? If I'm replying 00:03:02.819 --> 00:03:05.180 to a prompt about, say, the fall of the Roman 00:03:05.180 --> 00:03:08.199 Empire, why does the structure make me lose focus? 00:03:08.460 --> 00:03:11.219 Well, think about the visual hierarchy of a thread. 00:03:11.539 --> 00:03:13.819 You're usually not replying to the main prompt 00:03:13.819 --> 00:03:16.159 at the very top of the page. No, I'm not. You're 00:03:16.159 --> 00:03:19.199 hitting the reply button on a specific person's 00:03:19.199 --> 00:03:21.560 comment. Right. I'm responding to you, not the 00:03:21.560 --> 00:03:25.500 teacher. Exactly. So student A posts a thoughtful 00:03:25.500 --> 00:03:29.020 analysis of Rome. Student B reads it, but notices 00:03:29.020 --> 00:03:33.319 a minor point. Student A made maybe a comparison 00:03:33.319 --> 00:03:35.960 to a modern movie or even just a typo. Okay. 00:03:36.259 --> 00:03:38.680 Student B then replies to that specific detail. 00:03:39.020 --> 00:03:41.139 And then student C jumps in to argue about the 00:03:41.139 --> 00:03:43.180 movie and suddenly we're not talking about Rome 00:03:43.180 --> 00:03:45.919 anymore. We're arguing about the box office receipts 00:03:45.919 --> 00:03:49.180 of Gladiator. That is divergence. Ackerman notes 00:03:49.180 --> 00:03:51.360 that the conversation naturally drifts because 00:03:51.360 --> 00:03:54.300 the tool encourages interpersonal exchange over 00:03:54.300 --> 00:03:57.120 central analysis. It becomes about the reaction. 00:03:57.400 --> 00:04:00.159 to the reaction. So the architecture itself encourages 00:04:00.159 --> 00:04:03.159 sidebar conversations. It's the noisy cocktail 00:04:03.159 --> 00:04:06.039 party effect. That's a great way to put it, which 00:04:06.039 --> 00:04:08.400 isn't inherently bad. I mean, if your goal is 00:04:08.400 --> 00:04:12.280 just socialization, but if your goal is a rigorous, 00:04:12.580 --> 00:04:15.580 focused analysis of a core concept, it's messy. 00:04:15.780 --> 00:04:18.000 It's very messy. It relies on students having 00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:20.100 incredible discipline to stay on track. And let's 00:04:20.100 --> 00:04:22.220 be honest, nobody has that much discipline in 00:04:22.220 --> 00:04:25.279 the comment section. Very few do. So Ackerman 00:04:25.279 --> 00:04:27.800 contrasts this sharply with the second model, 00:04:28.019 --> 00:04:30.180 which kind of offers a solution to that noise. 00:04:30.600 --> 00:04:32.839 Blogs. Now this is where I needed the article 00:04:32.839 --> 00:04:35.480 to clarify things for me. Because, you know, 00:04:35.819 --> 00:04:37.839 a blog just feels like a discussion board with 00:04:37.839 --> 00:04:40.339 longer posts. I'm still just typing text into 00:04:40.339 --> 00:04:43.620 a box. But Ackerman makes a distinction about 00:04:43.620 --> 00:04:47.379 relative length and focus. How does a blog change 00:04:47.379 --> 00:04:50.600 the behavior? It comes down to ownership and 00:04:50.600 --> 00:04:53.319 a sense of territory. In a discussion board, 00:04:53.420 --> 00:04:55.379 your post is just one brick and a long wall. 00:04:55.560 --> 00:04:57.920 It's visually equal to everyone else's. In the 00:04:57.920 --> 00:05:01.160 blog model, the student is creating a standalone 00:05:01.160 --> 00:05:03.420 artifact. It's their own page. It's their house. 00:05:04.040 --> 00:05:06.220 Exactly. And Ackerman identifies two main uses 00:05:06.220 --> 00:05:08.459 for this. One is just posting reactions, but 00:05:08.459 --> 00:05:10.980 the second one is really powerful, the digital 00:05:10.980 --> 00:05:13.779 portfolio. A portfolio. So like a collection 00:05:13.779 --> 00:05:17.470 over time. Yes. A space where a student records 00:05:17.470 --> 00:05:20.649 their work and reflections over an entire course. 00:05:21.129 --> 00:05:23.670 It creates a narrative of their learning. But 00:05:23.670 --> 00:05:25.970 here's the really interesting psychological shift 00:05:25.970 --> 00:05:29.550 he observes. OK. The comments on blogs are fundamentally 00:05:29.550 --> 00:05:32.089 different from comments on discussion boards. 00:05:32.209 --> 00:05:35.509 Different how? Or they're just nicer? They tend 00:05:35.509 --> 00:05:38.490 to be more detailed. And crucially, they stick 00:05:38.490 --> 00:05:41.410 to the point. Why is that? It's the architecture 00:05:41.410 --> 00:05:44.439 of visiting. When you go to someone's blog to 00:05:44.439 --> 00:05:46.399 leave a comment, you're stepping into their space. 00:05:46.860 --> 00:05:49.180 You're not just firing off a hot take in a public 00:05:49.180 --> 00:05:52.639 square. You're commenting on a significant standalone 00:05:52.639 --> 00:05:55.600 piece of work. Ah, okay. And Ackerman notes that 00:05:55.600 --> 00:05:58.000 this context leads students to focus more on 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:00.480 the original post rather than veering off into 00:06:00.480 --> 00:06:02.360 side chats with each other. That makes a lot 00:06:02.360 --> 00:06:05.180 of sense. If I read a 500 word essay you wrote, 00:06:05.439 --> 00:06:07.660 I feel a social obligation to respond to your 00:06:07.660 --> 00:06:09.980 main thesis. I'm not going to just nitpick one 00:06:09.980 --> 00:06:11.639 sentence and start a fight with the guy below 00:06:11.639 --> 00:06:14.250 me. It commands a higher level of intellectual 00:06:14.250 --> 00:06:17.870 respect. So the takeaway here is if you want 00:06:17.870 --> 00:06:21.310 quick, chatty, back and forth, use a board. If 00:06:21.310 --> 00:06:24.230 you want depth and you want feedback to actually 00:06:24.230 --> 00:06:27.509 align with the goals, the blog is the superior 00:06:27.509 --> 00:06:30.029 tool. It's depth versus speed. OK, so those are 00:06:30.029 --> 00:06:31.910 the text titans where I write, then you write. 00:06:32.310 --> 00:06:34.149 But let's move to the third model. This is the 00:06:34.149 --> 00:06:37.029 one that I think is the most radical shift in 00:06:37.029 --> 00:06:41.189 mindset. Ah, yes. The collective brain. The wiki. 00:06:41.610 --> 00:06:43.629 This is where things get scary for the control 00:06:43.629 --> 00:06:45.810 freaks, and I include myself in that group. Yeah, 00:06:45.910 --> 00:06:48.170 me too. With boards and blogs I own my words, 00:06:48.310 --> 00:06:51.230 my name is on the post. But in a wiki, Ackerman 00:06:51.230 --> 00:06:53.649 says it's a single file authored by a group. 00:06:53.839 --> 00:06:56.300 That's the defining feature. It's a consensus 00:06:56.300 --> 00:06:58.139 document. It isn't a collection of opinions. 00:06:58.259 --> 00:07:00.240 It's a single source of truth created by the 00:07:00.240 --> 00:07:02.339 class. Which means any group member can edit, 00:07:02.620 --> 00:07:05.100 change, or, and this is the terrifying part, 00:07:05.500 --> 00:07:08.319 delete existing content. It requires a complete 00:07:08.319 --> 00:07:10.660 rewiring of the ego. You have to. Well, you have 00:07:10.660 --> 00:07:13.180 to move from this is my post to this is our document. 00:07:13.660 --> 00:07:16.459 It forces collaboration in a way that just posting 00:07:16.459 --> 00:07:19.139 and replying never will. But I have to ask the 00:07:19.139 --> 00:07:21.579 practical question here. We've all been in that 00:07:21.579 --> 00:07:24.180 group project. You know the one. One person does 00:07:24.180 --> 00:07:25.439 all the work, writes the whole thing, and the 00:07:25.439 --> 00:07:27.019 other three people just put their names on it 00:07:27.019 --> 00:07:30.199 and say, good job. How does a wiki solve that 00:07:30.199 --> 00:07:34.110 free rider problem? It's a valid fear. But Ackerman 00:07:34.110 --> 00:07:36.170 addresses this directly. He points out a feature 00:07:36.170 --> 00:07:38.509 that's kind of a big brother element, but for 00:07:38.509 --> 00:07:41.230 accountability. It's the version history. The 00:07:41.230 --> 00:07:43.410 receipt. The ultimate receipt. On the surface, 00:07:43.629 --> 00:07:46.290 the final wiki page looks clean. It doesn't show 00:07:46.290 --> 00:07:48.930 who wrote what. But the instructor can look behind 00:07:48.930 --> 00:07:51.129 the curtain. They can see every single edit, 00:07:51.329 --> 00:07:53.790 every deletion, every time stamp. So they can 00:07:53.790 --> 00:07:55.949 see that I wrote the entire analysis section 00:07:55.949 --> 00:07:59.279 on Tuesday at 2 AM? And you just logged in on 00:07:59.279 --> 00:08:03.540 Friday and fixed a comma. Exactly. Ackerman says, 00:08:03.779 --> 00:08:06.540 this solves the privacy assessment paradox. You 00:08:06.540 --> 00:08:09.420 get the benefit of a clean, cohesive final product, 00:08:09.439 --> 00:08:12.240 but the accountability is absolute. The instructor 00:08:12.240 --> 00:08:14.500 knows exactly who did the work. That actually 00:08:14.500 --> 00:08:16.439 makes me like it a lot more. It changes it from 00:08:16.439 --> 00:08:19.740 a group project, where you can hide, to a high 00:08:19.740 --> 00:08:21.759 stakes collaboration, where you really have to 00:08:21.759 --> 00:08:24.490 show up. It's the highest order of cognitive 00:08:24.490 --> 00:08:26.889 skill in this toolkit. You're not just sharing 00:08:26.889 --> 00:08:29.709 ideas, you're synthesizing them. Okay, so we've 00:08:29.709 --> 00:08:31.769 covered the asynchronous tools things people 00:08:31.769 --> 00:08:34.350 do on their own time, but Ackerman then shifts 00:08:34.350 --> 00:08:37.990 gears to going live. Right, the synchronous tools, 00:08:38.509 --> 00:08:40.750 where we all have to be in the same digital space 00:08:40.750 --> 00:08:43.929 at the same time. He lists two main ones, chat 00:08:43.929 --> 00:08:45.870 and video conferencing. Let's start with chat. 00:08:46.309 --> 00:08:48.769 Ackerman defines this as a synchronous form of 00:08:48.769 --> 00:08:51.399 text -based interaction. This feels like the 00:08:51.399 --> 00:08:54.539 modern workplace to me. Slack, Discord, the chat 00:08:54.539 --> 00:08:57.000 box in a webinar. It is. And the key dynamic 00:08:57.000 --> 00:08:59.620 is immediacy. Everyone sees the comments instantly. 00:09:00.340 --> 00:09:02.740 But Ackerman creates a very specific constraint 00:09:02.740 --> 00:09:05.779 here. He says for chat to actually work for learning, 00:09:06.120 --> 00:09:08.720 you need something specific. A fast piping speed. 00:09:09.000 --> 00:09:11.100 No, although that helps. You need a leader. A 00:09:11.100 --> 00:09:13.299 leader. Why does a text chat need a boss? Because 00:09:13.299 --> 00:09:16.179 of the signal -to -noise ratio. Without a leader 00:09:16.179 --> 00:09:19.019 to guide the discussion, a synchronous chat with, 00:09:19.019 --> 00:09:23.000 say, 20 people becomes a chaotic stream of consciousness. 00:09:23.740 --> 00:09:25.860 It's way worse than the discussion board because 00:09:25.860 --> 00:09:29.059 it moves so fast. I can visualize that. Three 00:09:29.059 --> 00:09:31.519 people typing at once, conversations crossing 00:09:31.519 --> 00:09:34.139 over each other, questions getting buried before 00:09:34.139 --> 00:09:38.019 they're answered. Exactly. Ackerman says a leader 00:09:38.019 --> 00:09:41.580 is needed to maintain focus. They act as the 00:09:41.580 --> 00:09:44.580 moderator, saying, OK, pause. Let's look at what 00:09:44.580 --> 00:09:47.019 Sarah just said, or let's pivot. They have to 00:09:47.019 --> 00:09:49.960 impose some linear order on all that chaos. But 00:09:49.960 --> 00:09:53.159 is there a benefit to that chaos? Or is it just 00:09:53.159 --> 00:09:55.820 noise? There is a huge benefit, and it's something 00:09:55.820 --> 00:09:58.419 spoken conversation doesn't have. Ackerman points 00:09:58.419 --> 00:10:00.820 out that chat transcripts can be saved. Right. 00:10:00.899 --> 00:10:03.240 If we have a verbal debate in class... Once the 00:10:03.240 --> 00:10:05.139 words are spoken, they're gone unless I'm taking 00:10:05.139 --> 00:10:07.879 furious notes. Exactly. But in chat, the transcript 00:10:07.879 --> 00:10:10.080 allows for later review. It feels ephemeral, 00:10:10.220 --> 00:10:12.440 fast and loose, but it's permanent and record. 00:10:12.559 --> 00:10:14.159 You can go back and mine that stream for gems 00:10:14.159 --> 00:10:16.740 later. Which brings us to the final tool. The 00:10:16.740 --> 00:10:19.299 heavy hitter. The one that consumed our lives 00:10:19.299 --> 00:10:22.799 for the last few years. Ugh. Video conferencing. 00:10:23.019 --> 00:10:25.320 Video conferencing. The closest proxy we have 00:10:25.320 --> 00:10:29.639 to being there. Real time video and audio. Ackerman 00:10:29.639 --> 00:10:32.299 describes it pretty simply. But I think we need 00:10:32.299 --> 00:10:34.919 to talk about why this is so different. It's 00:10:34.919 --> 00:10:37.559 a huge leap from text to video. Oh, it's the 00:10:37.559 --> 00:10:39.759 bandwidth. And I don't just mean internet speed, 00:10:39.840 --> 00:10:42.440 I mean information bandwidth. In every other 00:10:42.440 --> 00:10:45.539 tool we've talked about, bores, blogs, wikis, 00:10:45.600 --> 00:10:48.960 chat, you're just disembodied text. You're a 00:10:48.960 --> 00:10:51.720 font. Yeah. With video conferencing, you reintroduce 00:10:51.720 --> 00:10:54.240 the human animal. You see the nod, the confusion, 00:10:54.399 --> 00:10:56.980 the laughter, the bored stare. And Akraman mentions 00:10:56.980 --> 00:10:59.860 that these systems allow multiple users and recording. 00:11:01.049 --> 00:11:03.789 but it's always the best tool. I feel like sometimes 00:11:03.789 --> 00:11:06.210 we default to video just because it feels real 00:11:06.210 --> 00:11:08.230 even when we don't need it. That's the danger. 00:11:08.429 --> 00:11:10.769 It's high intensity. It requires everyone to 00:11:10.769 --> 00:11:13.090 be on. Ackerman notes it's great for that face 00:11:13.090 --> 00:11:15.570 -to -face connection, but it demands synchronous 00:11:15.570 --> 00:11:19.230 attention. You have to be there right now, fully 00:11:19.230 --> 00:11:21.590 present. So we have these five tools in our toolkit, 00:11:22.129 --> 00:11:23.909 but here's where the article really pivots into 00:11:23.909 --> 00:11:26.009 something actionable. He talks about the strategy 00:11:26.009 --> 00:11:28.350 of a lynching. Right, this is the so what of 00:11:28.350 --> 00:11:30.350 the entire piece. How do we actually use these 00:11:30.350 --> 00:11:32.809 things? He mentions a specific rule that I think 00:11:32.809 --> 00:11:35.690 every teacher, manager, or community leader needs 00:11:35.690 --> 00:11:39.149 to hear. Novelty is associated with attention. 00:11:39.710 --> 00:11:41.490 It's a fundamental principle of neuroscience. 00:11:41.919 --> 00:11:44.559 The brain ignores what's predictable. It just 00:11:44.559 --> 00:11:47.000 filters out the background noise. If a course 00:11:47.000 --> 00:11:49.460 is just post on the discussion board by Wednesday, 00:11:49.700 --> 00:11:52.460 reply by Friday, week after week. My brain goes 00:11:52.460 --> 00:11:54.860 on autopilot. I'm not learning. I'm performing 00:11:54.860 --> 00:11:57.860 a ritual. I'm filling out a form. Exactly. So 00:11:57.860 --> 00:12:00.460 Ackerman argues that instructors shouldn't just 00:12:00.460 --> 00:12:03.000 pick their favorite tool and stick with it. They 00:12:03.000 --> 00:12:06.080 need to use a variety of tools. So mix it up. 00:12:06.320 --> 00:12:09.799 Not just for fun. but for actual cognitive engagement. 00:12:10.059 --> 00:12:12.840 Yes. Do a blog one week to force deep reflection. 00:12:13.379 --> 00:12:15.639 Do a live debate in chat the next week for quick 00:12:15.639 --> 00:12:18.240 thinking. Build a wiki for the midterm to force 00:12:18.240 --> 00:12:21.200 collaboration. The variety itself wakes up the 00:12:21.200 --> 00:12:23.139 learner's brain. It's framing. You're changing 00:12:23.139 --> 00:12:24.740 the lens through which they see the content. 00:12:25.240 --> 00:12:28.019 Precisely. But he also issues a warning here, 00:12:28.139 --> 00:12:30.360 especially comparing this to the physical classroom. 00:12:31.159 --> 00:12:33.899 He emphasizes that online interaction, for the 00:12:33.899 --> 00:12:36.570 most part, tends to be asynchronous. A lag. The 00:12:36.570 --> 00:12:40.009 lag. And because of that lag and the lack of 00:12:40.009 --> 00:12:42.549 physical cues, he warns that discussions will 00:12:42.549 --> 00:12:46.129 naturally veer off topic if left alone. This 00:12:46.129 --> 00:12:47.750 goes right back to the discussion board trap 00:12:47.750 --> 00:12:50.090 we started with. It does. In a physical classroom, 00:12:50.149 --> 00:12:52.590 if a discussion starts going sideways, the teacher 00:12:52.590 --> 00:12:54.830 can just raise an eyebrow or clear their throat. 00:12:54.970 --> 00:12:57.090 Yeah, or just walk over to the whiteboard. Right. 00:12:57.090 --> 00:12:59.049 They can steer the room with body language. You 00:12:59.049 --> 00:13:01.470 don't have that online. If I post something crazy 00:13:01.470 --> 00:13:03.710 on the discussion board at midnight, the instructor 00:13:03.710 --> 00:13:06.740 might not see it until 9 a .m. By then, the threat 00:13:06.740 --> 00:13:09.139 is ruined. You can't steer a ship that sailed 00:13:09.139 --> 00:13:12.320 three days ago. Exactly. So Ackerman says this 00:13:12.320 --> 00:13:15.679 requires careful planning and prompting. You 00:13:15.679 --> 00:13:18.080 have to design the constraints into the assignment 00:13:18.080 --> 00:13:20.820 itself. You have to be the architect, not just 00:13:20.820 --> 00:13:23.340 the moderator. You have to build the walls of 00:13:23.340 --> 00:13:25.600 the maze before the students even step into it. 00:13:25.720 --> 00:13:27.840 That's a great way to put it. You can't just 00:13:27.840 --> 00:13:31.220 set up the tool and walk away. You have to anticipate 00:13:31.220 --> 00:13:33.419 the drift. OK, I want to zoom out for a second. 00:13:33.559 --> 00:13:36.100 Let's do a quick tactical recap for anyone listening 00:13:36.100 --> 00:13:38.500 who's designing a course or leading a remote 00:13:38.500 --> 00:13:41.120 team. Sure. Let's bring it down by goal. OK, 00:13:41.399 --> 00:13:44.399 scenario one. You want a casual, familiar space 00:13:44.399 --> 00:13:46.639 for people to chat. And you don't mind if the 00:13:46.639 --> 00:13:49.110 conversation wanders a bit. You want social glue. 00:13:49.370 --> 00:13:51.710 Use a discussion board. It's low friction. Everyone 00:13:51.710 --> 00:13:54.690 gets it. But keep the prompts tight if you want 00:13:54.690 --> 00:13:57.210 to avoid that cocktail party drift. Scenario 00:13:57.210 --> 00:14:00.289 two. You want deep, individual reflection. You 00:14:00.289 --> 00:14:03.009 want people to really own their ideas and give 00:14:03.009 --> 00:14:06.129 thoughtful, respectful feedback. Blogs. Definitely 00:14:06.129 --> 00:14:08.269 blogs. It gives them a stage, not just a seat 00:14:08.269 --> 00:14:11.450 in the crowd. Okay. Scenario three. You need 00:14:11.450 --> 00:14:14.409 the group to agree on a definition, build a policy, 00:14:14.730 --> 00:14:18.100 or create one project together. Wiki. But make 00:14:18.100 --> 00:14:19.740 sure you tell them you're checking the version 00:14:19.740 --> 00:14:22.320 history so everyone contributes. Use that Big 00:14:22.320 --> 00:14:26.179 Brother feature for fairness. Scenario 4. Fast, 00:14:26.320 --> 00:14:28.360 real -time brainstorming, but you can't get everyone 00:14:28.360 --> 00:14:30.860 on video, or maybe you just want a transcript 00:14:30.860 --> 00:14:34.559 of the ideas. Chat, but, and I can't stress this 00:14:34.559 --> 00:14:37.720 enough, appoint a moderator, be the leader, or 00:14:37.720 --> 00:14:40.110 it will just be noise. And finally, you need 00:14:40.110 --> 00:14:42.330 to reestablish human connection, read the room, 00:14:42.710 --> 00:14:45.549 or handle sensitive topics where tone really 00:14:45.549 --> 00:14:49.049 matters. Video conferencing. But use it sparingly 00:14:49.049 --> 00:14:51.970 so you don't burn everyone out. Save it for the 00:14:51.970 --> 00:14:54.330 high bandwidth moments. And underlining all of 00:14:54.330 --> 00:14:57.509 this is the novelty rule. Right. Keep the tools 00:14:57.509 --> 00:15:00.409 rotating. Keep the brain guessing. If the students 00:15:00.409 --> 00:15:02.490 know exactly what the interaction format will 00:15:02.490 --> 00:15:04.750 be for the next 12 weeks, you've already lost 00:15:04.750 --> 00:15:06.950 some of their attention. This has really changed 00:15:06.950 --> 00:15:09.029 how I look at my screen. It's not just content. 00:15:09.409 --> 00:15:11.929 The medium really is the message. When I tell 00:15:11.929 --> 00:15:15.509 my team to put it in Slack versus write a memo, 00:15:16.149 --> 00:15:18.190 I'm asking for a completely different type of 00:15:18.190 --> 00:15:19.750 thinking. You're asking for a different social 00:15:19.750 --> 00:15:22.289 behavior. You're designing the interaction. And 00:15:22.289 --> 00:15:24.649 usually, we do that unconsciously. Ackerman is 00:15:24.649 --> 00:15:27.110 asking us to do it consciously. So here's a final 00:15:27.110 --> 00:15:29.149 thought I want to leave everyone with. We talked 00:15:29.149 --> 00:15:31.240 about novelty. Ackerman says novelty creates 00:15:31.240 --> 00:15:33.500 attention. It makes total sense. But I'm thinking 00:15:33.500 --> 00:15:36.200 about how fast technology moves. Incredibly fast. 00:15:36.460 --> 00:15:39.779 Right. Video calls felt like magic 20 years ago. 00:15:40.240 --> 00:15:42.679 Now they're a Tuesday morning chore. Discussion 00:15:42.679 --> 00:15:44.980 boards were revolutionary in the 90s. Now they're 00:15:44.980 --> 00:15:48.500 just boring infrastructure. We habituate to everything. 00:15:48.779 --> 00:15:51.840 The novelty wears off. So if novelty is the only 00:15:51.840 --> 00:15:55.460 thing keeping us engaged, what happens when all 00:15:55.460 --> 00:15:58.679 these tools become standard? What happens when 00:15:58.679 --> 00:16:01.379 we run out of new ways to frame the interaction? 00:16:01.840 --> 00:16:04.299 That is the paradox, isn't it? Does the definition 00:16:04.299 --> 00:16:06.799 of interaction need to constantly evolve just 00:16:06.799 --> 00:16:09.639 to keep us awake? Or is there a point where the 00:16:09.639 --> 00:16:11.639 technology should actually disappear so we can 00:16:11.639 --> 00:16:14.379 finally just learn? Ideally, the tools become 00:16:14.379 --> 00:16:16.620 transparent. We shouldn't be thinking about the 00:16:16.620 --> 00:16:18.399 hammer. We should be thinking about the house. 00:16:18.820 --> 00:16:20.899 But until we get there, we have to keep shuffling 00:16:20.899 --> 00:16:22.720 the deck to keep people looking at the cards. 00:16:22.960 --> 00:16:24.480 Something to think about the next time you're 00:16:24.480 --> 00:16:27.429 typing a reply into a thread. Are you contributing 00:16:27.429 --> 00:16:29.710 to the divergence or are you building the wiki? 00:16:30.350 --> 00:16:32.350 Thanks for joining us on this deep dive. See 00:16:32.350 --> 00:16:32.769 you next time.