How to make valuable relationships with people through online courses (MOOCs): one story (Rhizo15)

1. How to really get to know people in an online
course?
Ask a child.
Tania Sheko @taniatorikova

2. What would a child do?
A child would play.

3. And so we did in Rhizo15, the connected MOOC.
It was new to me and I loved every minute.

4. I wanted to be playful so I wrote a play in response to the
weekly prompt:
"Learning subjectives: designing for when you don't know
where you're going."

5. I was unsure about how people would feel about the play - and if they would
read it at all - so I was surprised when I received lots of positive comments.

6. Terry Elliott suggested we make it into a radio play.
Simon Ensor added the comment: "I second Terry. I’m in
for rhizoradio or other play. Do we have to do casting for
the role of Mr X or do we crowdcast?"

7. I felt encouraged and sent out an invitation to a Google
Doc so we could write the play collaboratively.

8. Hello there. My name is Tania Sheko. Thanks for
responding so positively to this short piece of fiction/non-
fiction. I’m taking up the suggestion to create something
for #rhizoradio (suggested by Terry Elliott and seconded
by Simon Ensor) and other suggestions to do a
collaborative rewrite eg include a larger cast so we can
actually (somehow) create a podcast for #rhizoradio
(which is going to be a thing I think). Hope you can join me
here!

9. Here’s the Google Doc; this is what it looked like - so many new ideas!

10. But how would we bring everyone together to produce the
radio play/podcast?

11. Maha (from Cairo) was thinking about a live reading:
It’s near impossible to organize across timezones but if
you sleep really late and I wake really early we might catch
the ppl in the US or the opposite, if u wake really early and
I sleep really late we can make it at a good time for
everyone. Usually around 10pm my time that’s 2pm EDT
and I think early-ish morning for you?
This is how much people want to do it.

12. In the end we decided to record our own parts on
SoundCloud and send the file to Kevin Hodgson who
generously took the time to put it all together.

13. Other things also happened – you can’t keep up with the
rhizome. Actually, so much happened while I was
sleeping.
Photo by Moyan Brenn on Flickr

14. Ron recorded an introduction on Soundcloud.

15. Autumm Caines created a really neat video promo.

16. Autumm created the poster in
Pulp-O-mizer

17. Kevin created a Thinglink

18. So the play is finally written by people from USA, France, Egypt, Netherlands,
Germany, Australia, Canada and Scotland.
Collaborators:
Maha Bali (@Bali_Maha)
Jaap Bosman (@JappSoft)
Aras BOZKURT (@ARASBOZKURT)
Angela Brown (@angela_brown)
Autumm Caines (@autumm)
Barry Dyck (@barry_dyck)
Terry Elliott (@telliowkuwp)
Simon Ensor (@sensor63)
Keith Hamon (kwhamon)
Kevin Hodgson (@dogtrax)
Sarah Honeychurch (@NomadWarMachine)
James Kerr (@kerr63)
Yin Wah Kreher (@)yinbk)
Laura Ritchie (@laura)_ritchie)
Ronald Rudolf
Tania Sheko (@taniatorikova)

19. And after all the fun together...
Have I continued to interact with these
people?
You bet I have
in further MOOCs, Twitter, Google +, Facebook groups, Slideshare, Scoop.it,
Google Hangouts.
Wherever they are, I’m there too.

20. Who says you can’t form real relationships online.

21. Yes Tania we come together through by and
with play and then it continues act after act.
- Simon Ensor (today after reading my post)

22. Friendships, collaborations and creativity across
continents … the kernel of learning in engaging online
spaces.
Kevin

23. Friends take the time to make you stuff :)
Thank you, Kevin.

24. Some great MOOCs:
Connected Courses #ccourses
Rhizomatic Learning #Rhizo14/15/16?
MOOC MOOC
Connected Learning MOOC #CLMOOC