Learning #Ungrading via Twitter

My first Twitter Chat was awesome! In addition to finding new people to follow, and links to valuable #ungrading resources, I actually engaged in dialogue that helped me see things in new ways. The best conversation I was part of started with the tweet below.

I would say most of the time the content isn't the most important thing. @davecormier says the community is the curriculum and I believe the culture of our classrooms teach more than the content #ungrading

— Nicole Colter (@nicolecolter) December 19, 2020

So even though I’ve barely used Twitter, and had never participated in a Twitter Chat, I discovered Dave Cormier’s work in 2017, and I knew that he was active in these kinds of conversations. So once I mentioned him in my tweet, he quickly responded.

A colleague once pointed out the that word cover means to hide. I still think about that whenever anyone uses 'cover content' #ungrading @drjjacobs

— Dr. Heather Miceli ? (@hsmiceli) December 19, 2020

Together we were digging deeper into this illusion of ‘content’ and what it means to ‘cover’ it. Sprinkle in a little insightful humor from Dr. B. Haas’ mom’s education professor, and I start to realize this conversation has been going on for years among educators.

I think it was my mom (a K-12 teacher) who told me that one of her ed professors told the class “if you want to cover content, put a blanket over the textbook. Now it’s covered.”

— Dr. B. Haas (@belehaa) December 20, 2020

There were multiple responses to Dr. Heather Miceli’s colleague’s ‘cover means to hide’ insight. Bill J brings in the related word ‘discover’ and my heart leaps. I want my students to DIScover content.

I have never even thought about the word usage that way – thank you for the brilliant insight. I think we really do try to cover content instead of letting students discover content. Brilliant!

— Bill J (@NeuroscienceUT) December 20, 2020

We really were (un)covering something here.

Oh my goodness this is a wonderful thing. Getting to the etymology of our well used terminology (un)covers so much #ungrading

— Ann Gagné, PhD (@AnnGagne) December 20, 2020

After this conversation I was able to experience a deeper sense of freedom in thinking about my course redesign by focusing on…

• What might be all the ways my students can DIScover content?
• What might be all the ways to UNcover content?
• What might be all the ways to REcover the joy of learning?
• What might be all the more important things to learn than content?

Then I made a connection between the word ‘content’ we were discussing and the other meaning of the word…

And this made me think…

• How to keep DIScontent at bay for me and my students?
• How to be content without content?

I’m excited for my next #Ungrading Twitter Chat and so very grateful for the insights expressed by these educators.

Just a reminder, this is #SelfDirectedEducation