Sharing Documentation Electronically: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

In this journey of documenting and sharing learning in the makerspace, I have come to the conclusion that there are some things I'm getting better at, some things I have to develop and some things I have to simply start over.

For starters, I am very good sharing some of what is happening in our makerspace with my colleagues and professional learning communities on Twitter. I try for the most part to protect student privacy by only showing shots of the backs of their heads. (Even if their faces are shown, I ensure their parents have given informed consent) I endeavour to represent all of our students equally - especially after the gaffe in interpretation I realized in my last posting (documenting the learning of boys vs. girls).

However, as Stacey (2015) warns, there are pitfalls to sharing documentation electronically - that it is TOO expedient and we miss out on the value of the learning. In the process of sharing student learning, I am often omitting the all important step of reflection, posting just WHAT the students have done, not HOW they are learning or feeling. I must remember why I am producing this documentation in the first place to maintain the quality of the work.

Stacey (2015) presents questions we should ask ourselves before producing on-the-spot documentation:

• Have we included traces of the students' ideas, thoughts and questions?
• Have we taken the time to think through what this event means? Have we captured an aha moment, or the long period of trial and error, or the joy of discovery? Have we expressed this in an articulate way for the reader or viewer?

I reviewed some of my tweets in order to find out:

As I become more aware of my practices I know I will make the learning of my students become more visible. I will get better at this....eventually. :)