Case Study 2 for EIPT

The second Case Study I did was on Nurse.com.  I chose this site for two reasons.  Number 1 I am a nurse and when I browsed the site it had some interesting links and appears very informative. Below is a list of references that apply to both Case Studies. 

Nurse.com

Introduction

            A virtual learning community (VLC) is defined as an on-line community that is specifically designed for learning (Riel and Polin, 2004). The VLC that I have chosen is Nurse.com. I actually was googling for a site for nurse educators and in one of the sites it had a link to this site for discussion forums.  After browsing through the site I decided to become a member to have the availability to blog or participate in any discussion forums.  So far, I have been mostly an observer, although I did post an introduction on the introduction forum and have replied to a post on a new Associate Degree Nurse debating on whether to go back to school for her Bachelors in Nurse Science. The variety of learning opportunities in this site is impressive and I plan on enrolling in some of them.

            My first impression was that there was a lot to choose from.  I almost didn’t know where to begin.  The tabs at the top of the screen broke it down into categories and I pushed each one to see where it would lead.  I could look at job postings, broken down by specialty and/or by state, continuing education opportunities, nurse forums, blogs, nursing news, webinars and much more. I feel this would be a great source for continuing education hours and to stay on top of evidence based practice which important in the nursing profession.

Type of Community

            Riel and Polin (2004) state that there are three types of virtual learning communities that can overlap: task-based, practice-based and knowledge based.  Nurse.com is a combination of practice-based and knowledge-based. It is practice-based because nursing is a large group with a shared goal and nurse.com has an environment of learning (Riel and Polin, 2004). It can also be considered knowledge-based because it is a “process of continual change to a common external knowledge base” (Riel and Polin, 2004).  Although with the above I feel this community is more practice-based oriented due to the participants have the availability to participate in educational opportunities related to nursing and can become fully involved with all of its available resources and the history of the practice to give them educational guidance (Riel and Polin, 2004)

            The Nurse.com website is actually run by Gannett Healthcare Group out of Illinois (Nurse, 2011).  Their mission is stated to “enrich the professional lives of nurses and other healthcare professionals and to celebrate their unique contributions to society” (Nurse, 2011). With its’ many webinars, discussion forums and continuing education opportunities a nurse can keep up with the many changes in nursing especially now with the change to electronic health records as mandated by the government.

Community Structure

            Nurse.com is a VLC where a person in the healthcare industry can become a member at no cost.  It doesn’t matter if you are a Nurse Aide or a Clinical Nurse Specialist, everyone is welcome and can learn.  I feel like the discussion forums can be a good source of information as well as the blogs.  It is easy to be a lurker and just read the posts and blogs and learn from other more experienced nurses or actively participate by asking questions or blogging. 

            My observations on the discussion forums are that there are no moderators to keep the discussions going. In one of them there hadn’t been a post this year at all.  This is concerning in keeping participants staying active. I did like the list of continuing education courses available. They had a list of free courses as well as ones that would require payment.  The membership to the site also included a free NurseWeek Magazine subscription.

Design Features and Technology

            Riel and Polin (2004) states for a practice-based community to survive it has to use a combination of old knowledge, new knowledge and ongoing participation of diverse members.  Nurse.com does appear to meet the criteria.  It has participations from all areas of nursing, from Case Managers to Nurse Aides to Staff Nurses and uses the combined knowledge and provides continuing education classes and webinars for each area.  It has a social aspect to it with nurse forums for questions regarding furthering education or changing of areas of expertise.  It stays on top of the political arena and has news articles that can, and will, affect nurses.  I was impressed with the education opportunities regarding electronic charting.  This is a fast approaching arena and needs to be addressed.  Nurse.com is addressing it and providing nurses with the learning tools they need to succeed.

Summary

            This case study was an interesting education opportunity that has enriched my technological learning.  Both communities had their positive points and I feel that they will be available for new learners and social networkers for a long time.  Facebook is listening to their members and providing new games and causes for their patrons to join.  They also make it easy to find friends from the past and present.  Nurse.com is a great place for nurses to communicate to other nurses for social interaction as well as learning opportunities. It meets the attributes for a practice-based learning environment.  The webinars and continuing education opportunities are appropriate for the needs of nurses today.  I envision them to continue to provide educational opportunities appropriate for these fast changes in healthcare.

References

Facebook (2010). Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/facebook.

Facebook (2011). Retrieved from http://www.facebook.com/facebook#!/facebook?sk=info

Nurse (2011). Retrieved from http://www.nurse.com/aboutus.html.

Renninger, K. A. & Shumar, W. (2010). Death of media moo. Building virtual communities:                    

            learning and change in cyberspace. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press.

Riel and Polin (2004). Online Learning Communities: Common ground and technical difference  

           

            in designing technical environments. In S. A. Barab, R. Kling, J. H. Gray, (eds.),  

           

            Designing for virtual communities in the service of learning. NY: Cambridge University    

            Press.

Case Study 1 for EIPT

The first Case Study I chose to do was on Facebook.  This was fun to do as I am a member of Facebook but mainly to watch for pictures of my grandkids and friends kids as well.  Hope you enjoy reading it.

Facebook

Introduction

            Facebook is the virtual community I have chosen for my case study.  I chose this community for two reasons. The first is my three grown children are members and second after finding out my ex-husband was a member I decided I better join if I want to keep up with my girls as well as technology.  Facebook was developed in February 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg and was available to only students at Harvard University (Facebook, 2010).  By September 26, 2006 it was available to anyone over the age 13 with a valid e-mail address and has over 600 million active users (Facebook, 2010).

            Thinking back to when I first started using Facebook I was more of a lurker, although my girls tell me in the Facebook world this is called being a creeper. I personally like the term lurker better.  I set up my profile which included where I work, marital status, birth date, where and what year I graduated from high school and other personal information. I immediately asked my girls and close friends to be my “friend” on facebook. This lets you see any posts they type in and any pictures they upload.  I thoroughly enjoy the picture portion as I frequently get to see updated pictures of my grandkids in California. There are several areas to leave messages for your friends. There are private messages, basically like e-mail in the facebook site, post on their “wall” for everyone to see and, if they are on line you can “chat” with them. The “wall” is the user home page with profile where you upload your pictures and change your status or just post a comment for everyone to see. The “chat” is always available whether you are reading posts or playing one of the hundreds of games or virtual communities linked to the facebook site. I feel I am more than a lurker now but not as active as some people. While observing I notice that several people post at least every day if not several times a day. They will say what they are doing, where they are, what is upsetting them just as if you were sitting right there with them.  I am a little more reserved then that. I really don’t want everyone knowing my every move and my feelings. But, I do wish people happy birthday when the reminder comes up and I comment on a few posts. I haven’t joined any of the causes that are available but I am sure at some point a cause will catch my attention and I will jump on board with the rest of the Facebook world. 

Type of Community

            According to Renninger and Shumar (2010), “virtual communities are defined by content” (pg. 6). The Facebook community is considered a social network.  It is designed to be a community for friends and family to communicate, send pictures, chat and play games against each other.  Facebook (2011) has a mission statement as stated below:

           

            “Facebooks’ mission is to give people the power to share and make the

            world more open and connected.”

            Facebook has various ways to get connected to present friends and locate past friends. I had to opportunity to “friend” a person that I have not seen since high school. It makes keeping in touch or re-connecting a lot easier and helps everyone stay connected.  Even if you don’t regularly e-mail your friends or chat with them, most of the time you keep in mental touch with them just by reading their posts. 

            Members in this virtual community can use their imagination and change their profile picture to just about anything they want.  They can join causes, play games and try to beat their friends scores, play in the virtual interactive communities like Farm Town, Café World and Farmville where you can develop your farm or café, invite friends as neighbors and have an interactive community with your friends.  I participated in Farm Town for quite a while and plowed my fields, planted crops, harvested crops, sold the harvest and helped neighbors on their farms.  You had to save your money to buy farm equipment, more seed, buildings and supplies.  Your imagination could go quite wild. 

Community Structure

            Facebook is a virtual community that anyone over the age of thirteen can join, for free, as long as they have a valid e-mail address (Facebook, 2010). A member can make it as private or as open as he or she desires.  A new member enters their personal information into their profile which others can see, if they ask to be that persons’ friend.  Then you can search for friends by name, where they work, go to church, or where they went to high school or college. 

            With it being a social network there is no set rule on what is discussed.  It is an open field.  As long as it is not offensive to anyone you can talk about it.  You can share recipes, ask questions about what you are learning in school or at work or ask advice. The community is shaped by the friends the friends that are chosen, the topics that are discussed and the games or interactive communities that are participated in.  I have observed, and participated in, encouraging a friend that had lost a loved one. The outpouring of love to this individual through the postings was very evident.  People were adding to her wall daily to encourage her and uplift her. 

Design Features and Technology

            Renninger and Shumar (2010) states that people who choose to be a part of a virtual community are more inclined to think they are benefiting from their involvement. Success can be measured by the number of members that are participating. With Facebook, it is obviously a success with its 600 million active users.

            Facebook has an app where concerns can be posted and I am assuming addressed. They are frequently adding new games and developing more interactive communities. They appear to be adjusting to the demands of the community by changing privacy policies and putting in safeguards for each user to address what parts of their profile and posts they want people to see. With everything I observed I think Facebook will be around for a very long time.



EIPT Blog Week of April 18-23

This week has been a fast paced week in both my classes with projects due and discussion forums.  I am finding myself behind and hope everyone is forgiving.  Activity 3 and 4 in Bonk and Zhang (2008) are activities titled displaying and doing which I have actually enjoyed putting together with Janine. 

In AA3 (a) we chose a YouTube Video for students to view.  This video is produced by senior level students depicting a disease process and/or nursing interventions.  Students are then asked to answer questions regarding the presentation in the YouTube Video in a comment box.  This produces critical thinking which covers the doing phase of the R2D2 Model in Bonk and Zhang (2008).  All of this is the Constructivism concept under the Cognitive Theory. 

Also in AA3 (b) we have students developing a concept map based on a case scenario.  This again is relates to the Cognitive Theory.  Another AA4 activity will be a discussion forum titled Students Mentoring Students.  Each discussion forum will be labeled according to possible need. Ie: nursing process.  Level 1 students will be able to ask questions regarding the nursing process and assigned senior level students will be assigned to answer.  Faculty will be monitoring and facilitating questions as needed. 

Janine and I have begun building our site on PBWorks and have thoroughly enjoyed it.  We look forward to working more on it this next week.

EIPT Week of April 4 – 9

This week’s reading assignments were from Clark & Mayer, E-learning and The Science of Instruction and Bonk and Zhang, Empowering Online Learning.  Both books are easy to read and very informative. Clark and Mayer (2008) talks about the coherence principle which states you don’t add extra material to a learning activity that doesn’t help with the learning objective (pg 133). In Chapter 4 it talks about not adding unnecessary graphics or even music that might distract the learner. He quoted some studies that revealed students obtained higher scores when there was less graphics and/or music in the background to clutter the minds. Clark and Mayer (2008) states “background music and sounds may overload working memory” (pg 136).  This was a very interesting comment to me. I thought having classical music in the background was a positive thing while I was studying.  I did know that any songs with lyrics or intense classical songs were distracting but I never thought the music was overloading my memory.  Needless to say the music is off and I now study in a quiet environment. I thought it was also interesting that low level learners are more at risk to being overloaded with not only background noise but extra un-needed graphics or animation (Clark and Mayer, 2008, pg 145).  I also liked the fact that studies support the use of conversational style of presentation.  This is called the Personalization Principle (Clark and Mayer, 2008, pg 157). I never really thought of the computer as “social conversational partner” (pg 158). But, it makes sense. Clark and Mayer (2008) also talk about breaking down the lessons into small bits so a student won’t get overloaded. I know when I am doing an on-line activity, if it is too long, I lose interest or my mind just starts wandering. They recommend a breaking a lesson down into “sixteen segments with a continue button in the bottom right” (pg 189).  In Chapter 14, Clark and Mayer (2008) discuss how to build critical thinking skills or creativity.  They state that “specific programs are most useful when cognitive skills must be applied in a certain arena” (pg 323). We have a web-based learning environment where I work that teaches CPR. We are given case-scenarios and are asked to react to the scenario as we would in real life. It makes you do some critical thinking and helps with your reaction time to these scenarios.  This week’s readings helped me realize some areas in my personal learning and teaching experience need to change. I have noticed that without the music on I am able to focus better and am getting this blog done a little faster than usual. In building our web-site I will use a lot of the principals found in Clark and Mayer (2008), and in Bonk and Zhang (2008) with their R2D2 model, read, reflect, display and do.

Thanks for reading my blog.

Suzanne

Bonk, C.J., Zhang K. (2008). Empowering online learning 100+ activities        for reading, reflecting, displaying, & doing. San Francisco, CA:  Jossey-Bass

Clark, R.C., Mayer, R.E., (Eds.) (2008). E-learning and the science of    instruction: proven guidelines for consumers and designers of multi-media learning. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer.