Follow-Up to Lesson

The open-ended lesson was piloted, and interesting things that would apply to emergent curriculum and emergent program planning came out. Specifically, what surprised me was the quiet in the room (I had expected spirited conversation and interaction), the mild confusion about being given freedom to move around the room at will (I had expected relief), and the slight discomfort with a less-guided activity (I had expected hunger to learn to emerge). Students did have a series of questions to consider, but it wasn't until they played around with another program planning model in groups that the connections to the other models placed around the room began to be made. Note to self: start with the safety of group discussion and shared dialogue to illuminate the topic and build a base of shared experience, and THEN get students to venture out alone.

Of interest for program planning was that this border between order and chaos, the structured and the unstructured, is probably important to emergent program planning as well. While some people thrive in the self-directed environment, and are comfortable with the unpredictability of "emergence", the diversity of the stakeholder group would suggest that the management of change, the management of connections, and the management of concept-reassembly need to be considered thoroughly. The program planner needs to be able to do this management, and to be comfortable with a certain degree of unpredictability and emergence. The idea of remembering that familiar ground makes for a better take-off spot than unknown territory is also valuable. (Ie. committees need to come to an understanding of something before they can move into new risks).

Walking the Talk

Tonight I'm going to practice what I preach. The purpose of the lesson is for students to understand the role of program planning models, to consider how different models reflect different beliefs and value systems, and to begin to develop their own model. Instead of teaching anything up front though, I'm going to start by putting information about different models, old and new (some by fancy theorists and some by former students of mine), around the room. I'm going to give some basic instructions and some basic questions, and then let students wander around the room discussing what they see. At the end, we'll have a discussion about the models. I have no idea where it'll go, but I trust that no matter where they go with it, it'll be relevant. I'll tackle whatever arises.

This is emergent lesson planning, but how does this link with emergent program planning? I think if I can get students to understand the interconnectedness of the pieces, then they'll be better able to see the whole. If they see program planning as a continual discovery of options, not the rigid carrying out of a predetermined process, then they'd be prepared for some of the chaos that is inevitable in program planning. That ability (capacity?) would allow them to approach a program planning task with greater openness.

Ie. is teaching how to plan programs really about helping people develop a process-based mindset? Is gaining comfort with emergence and the unpredictable, transformative aspects of the work as important as the technical-rational piece of "how to"?

One more quick addition:

It just occurred to me that program planning models, as far as I know, are missing the element of time. They describe program planning itself as a product, not as a process. We need a model that, like Picasso's "Nude Descending a Staircase", shows an ever-evolving, emergent planning process. When we start a program planning process from scratch, we have our preconceived ideas and a bit of information, but not much more. As we begin to work with various components and see how the various "ingredients" we have foraged from the landscape fit together, and new ones begin to reveal themselves, we begin to have ideas about what needs to happen next. We learn, we integrate, we apply, we fail or succeed, and we then continue on our path of foraging and assembling.

I think what I'll do is look at the various components of program planning as we tend to identify them today (needs assessment, for example, seems critical in a new way of doing things) and look at them from a technical-rational perspective, a practical perspective, a political perspective, but then also from an emergent/connected perspective. We'll see what that does!

I'm beginning to see how my science fair project in grade 8 (Time and Space), and my interest in emergence/chaos theory etc, what I learn from wilderness canoeing, and my newfound interest in program planning fits together. :) And too bad I now have to admit publicly what a nerd I am.

New Students; Fresh Start

I've started teaching Program Planning again with a small group of great students. The first class was about what constitutes adult ed and about the role of the program planner in that larger context. The conversation was rich and varied, and I watched them struggle with their assumptions about adult ed as being a structured, formal, authoritative "product". They made significant moves however towards the idea that adult education/learning is a process, not a product. And that conversation will continue throughout the course.

The link between adult learning as process and the planner's work as "process management" did not yet appear however. That will come. It's a process in itself. Learning is a process; planning is a process; learning about learning is a process; learning about planning is a process! :)

I also had a great conversation with a colleague this week. Not a colleague in the conventional sense, as it's someone I only connect with occasionally. She's a colleague in the sense that we both plan complex programs and struggle with the ethics and politics of programs that we plan. It takes concentration and mindfulness to maintain integrity (reflecting one's values in one's actions) when confronted with strong and potentially opposing forces.

Anyway, she thinks about these things too, and had some interesting ideas about the work of making connections and relationships in planning programs. It struck such a chord with my own ideas about what makes for a good (successful) program planning experience, and how without good process management we fail in planning good programs.

It all makes me think more and more about the ideas that keep rolling around in my head about needing to move to new models of planning programs. If I read the history of program planning, I see progression from Tyler (linear) through Cervero and Wilson (political) to Sork (practical, process-reflective) to Cafarella (organic), but I think it's time we take the next step. Each of the theorists in the past worked from within their times. They looked scientifically at their craft if their world was looking at things scientifically. They saw things politically when post-modernism and the different "-isms" were coming to the fore. They moved to systems approaches when systems theory was big. I think we now need to incorporate the ideas of social networking more firmly.

Last year, I had some delicious conversations with colleagues about connectivism, and I haven't stopped thinking (or writing) about it, although I've done it more privately. However, it keeps gnawing at me, and so I need to be true to that gnawing again and try - again - to come up with a model of program planning that reflects our times now. Not as a theorist, but as a practitioner. We need change in program planning. We need to take what we've learned from Tyler, Cervero and Wilson, Cafarella, and all the others in between, and take the next step. We need to use what we're learning about the online universe to come up with new ways of planning programs and supporting adult learning, in the broadest sense of the word.

Who will I find to join me in the discussion?