Only What I Know: My Learning Process and What I Learned From It

My Achievements

I was successful in a number of ways. I got a guitar. I learned to string it. I learned to tune it. I got a metronome. I got a tuner. I got a pick. I got a book. I bought lessons. I found online resources. I used those resources and participated in guitar talk with people I don’t know. I practiced each week. Still, I fell short in a number of ways. Most notably I did not learn in time a beginner’s song as I’d originally hoped. I can strum and I can remember finger placement for three chords and four notes well enough, I suppose, but I think I’m a couple of weeks off from properly playing my song. Even so, I was pleasantly surprised to find I could use online resources to get better at the sort of task that has in the past required me to learn almost exclusively from a teacher in a face-to-face setting.

My Experience as a Learner

This learning experience was for me a successful one in many ways, perhaps mostly because I’ve had to articulate my process by way of this blog. By writing out my thoughts and my steps on this blog, I’ve had to think and express myself clearly on how I learn, what has worked, what hasn’t, and what I’d do differently next time in order to learn more effectively and efficiently. Writing things out has been good for me, that is. I was motivated to practice each week because I set a goal and because I am writing publicly in this blog about how I am making (and not making) progress toward my goal. Perhaps the thing that frustrated or discouraged me most was the realization that I would not be able to timely achieve my goal as originally hoped and that I should have set a less ambitious goal. Maybe I should have just tried to learn how to do the Dougie. The whole point of the song is to teach a dance. How hard could it be?

My Process as a Learner

I had three main resources to support my learning process: a book, a teacher, and the internet. In the past, I would have leaned most heavily on the teacher followed by the book with the internet in last place. However, this time the order was reversed. That’s because I was most helped by the questions I asked at the guitar fora and the answers I received from helpful yet anonymous people on those websites. The conversations I had on these websites and the collaboration I experienced as a result of these conversations was really my first experience with web-based participatory learning outside of my courses in this program. These conversations required a form of communication -- a digital literacy -- that I was not familiar with at first but now feel comfortable in using.

Specifically, web forum speak -- a language I think I’ve now picked up -- provided me access to an awful lot of information on a wide variety of guitar topics that I would not otherwise have had access to.  The great thing about web fora interaction is that it is anonymous and it is understood that the basis for association is nothing other than the common interest in the subject under discussion. This means it is fine to walk away from people who offer unhelpful interaction. That’s not always possible in a face-to-face interaction where identities are fully disclosed and there is a person who can react in an unpredictable way.

Implications for Instructional Practice

This experience has taught me the importance of project based learning and of the importance in allowing students to choose the subject and goals of a project based learning assignment. My inability to achieve the goal I set for myself implies that I will need to engage with students early and often during the course of project formulation and milestone achievement in order to help students determine whether they are making adequate progress toward the goal they’ve set and, if not, then allow modification of the project and its goal or perhaps even a complete revision and restart. What I’ve seen is that goals initially set are not necessarily informed by experience so much as hope, and that that is an insufficient basis in some cases for determining milestones and expectations.

Implications for Teaching 21st Century Literacies

My engagement in participatory learning required what I’ve referred to above as forum speak, a literacy skill. There is an anonymous exchange of information that takes place in web fora. This exchange follows a set of rules. These rules are partly expressed in FAQs on the website but they are mostly embedded (without announcing themselves as rules) in the way that people on the fora address one another. This manner of exchange is not like the way that teacher and student relate to one another in a face-to-face context. The relationship online is between equals. There is no designated teacher and learner. Anyone in the fora can play either role in any conversation. Everyone is anonymous. There is little harm in saying the “wrong” thing as no bad reputation can attach to an online identity that is made up simply for the purpose of participating in the forum. This fact allows people to exchange ideas and information more freely than they would otherwise. There are some dangers associated with this fact too.

Literacy instruction in the classroom must be designed to account for both the quick accessibility of anonymously offered and potentially expert information and the danger of potentially abusive interaction created by the same anonymity. Research or skill building projects that make use of online fora must include guidance about what students are likely to learn from such resources in addition to the sort of risks involved in seeking it out, to say nothing of parental involvement, which may be key in minimizing risk of student exposure to abusive language.

Only What I Know: My Digital Identity, Blogging and Online Collaboration

Blogging and My Digital Identity

Before I began blogging for this class, I did not have a digital identity, none that I knew of, at least. Now I am at least aware that all the things I do or say on the internet -- including this blog post -- will probably be around forever somewhere, and that that’s my identity, good, bad or indifferent. Google now tells me I am part of the blogosphere. (I did not think to look before this class.) While looking for my impact on the internet, I even found some blog posts I wrote years ago and completely forgot about!

The overly paranoid Rob Lowe in me understands that my online activity is probably tracked and stored by someone somewhere, whether by business, government, or the illuminati. And I know that this information could even be used against me later on, particularly if it is even seemingly negative or questionable. Thinking on my digital identity has made me more careful about how I present myself on the internet. (I’m looking right at you, Facebook.) I know I must also advise my students to be careful too.

Collaborative Learning and My Digital Identity

My blogging hasn’t made a star in the blogosphere yet. I’m still hard to find. (That’s a good thing, I think.) But it is fun to see where I posted anonymously on guitar websites. Although no one knows what I wrote, it is personally gratifying to know I started conversations that may help other guitar learners a week or even years later. The folks at the guitar sites don’t know who I am but that does not prevent them from acting in a (mostly) neighborly way, sharing with me tips and tricks on learning guitar.

Only What I Know: Collaboration is part of the learning process

Influence

I am learning one note at a time with my book. I am also reading what other guitar learners are learning and talking about at my online guitar groups, Guitar Noise and Guitar for Beginners. Each site has a forum that hosts conversations on subjects that are relevant to where I am in the process of learning guitar. I’ve posted at each a couple of times. Although I do not have anyone I could call a mentor yet, and I haven’t started in person training either, the responses at the websites have helped me understand how to tune my guitar and how to know when my strings need to be replaced.

Challenges

The main challenges posed by online collaboration (e.g., via forum conversation) is that the advice I receive is based only on the information I provide, is not instantaneous, and is offered by anonymous people who may or may not be expert for all I really know. The advice from online collaboration sometimes conflicts with other advice earlier received. It can also be indeterminate, inaccurate, too general, etc. This is because the advice is not based on the advisor’s direct experience with my situation.

Conflicts

In my experience so far, conflicting advice does arise during online collaboration. Its presence has caused me to wonder which of two or more competing sources is to be trusted. Sometimes I even question whether any competing source knows what is best for me to do in my situation. When there is a conflict on what I should do, I try to resolve it by weighing the evidence and argument supporting the competing opinions. When that does not do the trick, I just do my own research! The upside of conflict is that it requires me to think hard about who is right and how I know and whether I need to get additional information from other sources.

Divergence

Online collaboration seems to produce divergence, not a restraint on creativity. I say that because if you ask online for an opinion on this product or that, or this method or that, you’re bound to get a lot of differing views, and some of these will be unexpected and quite creative. Even when those opinions don’t solve my problem, at least they get me thinking about what else I might do to fix things.

Net Effect

Although it can be particularly tricky and time consuming to sort via the internet the good advisors and good advice from the bad, online collaboration has so far been a net positive for me. That’s because I’m a curious person who likes going from one topic to a related but distinct topic. When I ask a question, I get lots of answers to choose from. Some are good. Some are not so good. But the collaboration itself provides me many opportunities to follow up on the advice received by asking better, sharper questions and by doing my own research, which I enjoy.

Only What I Know: I know learning guitar is a process.

Process and Challenges

My classes have not started yet, though I have signed up for a yahoo group for guitar enthusiasts in Seattle. I wouldn’t meet until I get much better, however. I don’t want to be bad at guitar in person. To get up on the basics I am mostly using the book. The book indicates that the player’s fingers go around the neck of the guitar for many to most of the chords. I look at finger placement in the book and try to do what I see. Sometimes my fingers are just not long enough for the proper placement. Other times it takes a little more finger dexterity than I’ve got at the moment.

I looked to Google images for other ways of visualizing finger placement, to get at the ideas from another angle. I also went to YouTube for instruction on pick selection, timing/rhythm of strumming, and how to tune the guitar. I don’t have a physical tuner and my guitar is out of tune. I downloaded and tried out Yousician but my guitar is simply too out of tune right now for the app to pass me on to its skill building section. I’ll have to get a tuner or try out the online tuners. That’s the next big step, I’d say.

Goals and Accomplishments

So after one week I’m not surf guitar legend Dick Dale yet. I can strum. I like the sound it makes. I can’t yet play Dick Dale’s Misirlou, the theme song to Pulp Fiction, but I’ve got a basic understanding now of hand position, finger placement, strumming, timing, half and quarter notes and, more importantly, how to get more information/help when I get stuck, which I can tell is going to happen an awful lot between where I am now and Dick Dale. Since I can’t do Misirlou just yet, I went to Amazon for some songs I could conceivably play in the foreseeable future.

Guitar and Participatory Learning

As a teacher who wants to know how to teach students how to learn anything in the information age, this experiment in learning guitar has got me in a reflective mood, and feeling hopeful, too. I see now that every problem is just a good search away from its solution. (And a little patience for the trial and error process to unfold.) The key to a good search, it seems, is knowing the search engine, how it works, what search terms it uses, etc., and how to ask a good question, one that is directly relevant to the problem I’m looking to solve. Once I know the engine and how to turn my question into a query that the engine recognizes, it is just a matter of selecting which of the proposed solutions to try out first!

Only What I Know: I don’t know guitar … yet.

Starting at the age of four, I took piano lessons every week. To prepare for the lesson I would read and write in a theory book; I would practice playing all the assigned songs. When I later learned to also play by ear, I created my own chords and songs. Because I wanted feedback on my musical creations, but didn’t have an audience, I pretended that people were listening to me play.

In junior high, I got the audience I wanted through band class and school recitals. There was no piano in band, however, so I had to pick a different instrument. I chose the flute. Because I knew piano, I also knew how to read music, unlike many others in band. I did not stick with the flute, and eventually quit band, but the success I had playing two instruments led me to believe I could learn to play any instrument.

About eight years ago, my father in law got me a guitar for Christmas. Unfortunately, I had little time to learn to play it. I had three babies to care for. I taught school. I had a marriage and house to attend to. Although I continued to play piano from time to time, and love music in general, learning to play a new instrument was not a priority for me. Now, years later, things are different. The kids are bigger, I am a more efficient teacher, house and family are in order, and, importantly, I’m in a class that calls for learning new things in new ways. Now is a good time to learn guitar.

I’ve gathered resources, set some goals, and I have anticipated challenges. I pulled the old guitar out from the closet, bought some picks, got a book, and found some videos on the Internet. I aim to learn to play a beginner’s song by six weeks. Although I have a music background, achievement of this goal is far from automatic. Guitar is not the same as piano. I will need to learn to use my fingers in a different way. I will need to know finger positions for all notes and chords. I will need to know the special rhythm and beat of playing a stringed instrument.

Although I appreciate the wealth and diversity of video and textual training materials available today (like this, this, and this), I am not only or even principally a visual learner. I am also an auditory and kinesthetic learner, one who benefits from in-person question-and-answer as the means of direct oversight of my trial-and-error learning process. Unfortunately, I don’t know anyone in my immediate area that plays guitar and is willing to mentor me in this way, so I purchased four training sessions to supplement the resources identified above.

I will know I am making progress toward my above stated goal when I rightly apply the textual/visual materials and yet come up with a list of questions/problems for resolution with the trainer. I will know I am making progress when that list changes over time, when old problems are solved and new ones emerge, that is. Early problems to overcome will likely include: identifying all the parts of the guitar by name and feel, consistently holding the guitar the right yet comfortable way, being able to tune the guitar on my own or with a tuner, playing major chords with ease, strumming a pleasing sound, and overcome finger pain.

This is just what I expect to happen. I don’t really know what sort of challenges I’ll actually get stuck on at the beginning stages. Here’s what I do know: learning to play a beginner song on guitar with limited personal training won’t be easy for me, but I’m determined to make it happen one way or another.