Miramar Online Teaching and Learning: Week 7, Fall 2019

ECAR Study of Community College Students and Information Technology, 2019

Guest Blogger

Laura Hofmann

Teaching Personal Growth 120 Online

Seen and Unseen: Extroverts and Introverts in College Online Learning

As a Career Counselor, my world is steeped in personality preferences such as introversion and extroversion, and how that plays in to career preferences, professional relationships, processing of information and so on. While speaking in terms of introversion and extroversion can be borderline over simplistic, it nevertheless has a time and place when helping students uncover aspects of themselves, and how that might relate to the ways they see themselves reflected in the world of work, to make choices with a sense of confidence and self awareness.

Over the years, in teaching campus based in person courses in Career and Life Planning, Human Development, and College Success, I utilize assessments such as the Myers-Briggs within the first week of class, to help students determine whether they identify as introverted or extroverted. We use self identification, classroom exercises, Youtube videos, lectures, and related assignments to further deconstruct introversion and extroversion. Students learn that the difference lies not just in the commonly held perception of outgoing individuals vs. the wallflowers, but also what energizes us, our preferred sources of intake of information, and how we interpret that input within.

As I watch the class move through this process and observe them throughout the semester, it becomes undeniably clear to me who the introverts and extroverts are. The hand raisers, the voice projectors, the chance takers. The group leaders, the beloved verbose, the endless contributors, the ones whose names you can’t help but remember first; for the way they make themselves known. They sit juxtaposed with the shy, timid and by turns pondering and thoughtful. The think before you speak, words are a precious resource, I’ll get back to you tomorrow types. I sincerely appreciate them all in their overt and covert contributions.

Yet, try as I might to draw the introverts out...certain things are just a matter of environment. While some introverts just need time, or a carefully crafted tending to come out of their shell, others remain as stoic and poker faced on the last day, as they did on the first. I will always invite, but I will never insist.

Speaking of environment, something interesting happened to me this semester, as I created my very first Canvas course to teach fully online. I adapted the materials I had to suit the new format, and evaluated the assignments to make sure the effect was the same, if not enhanced by the online delivery. I assigned class discussions, Flip Grid responses where students interfaced directly, group assignments, in addition to typical assignments where students responded not to each other, but directly to me. Within a few weeks of the class starting I noticed something, or more specifically, the lack of something. I realized that I had not noticed, or been able to discern who the introverts and extroverts were.

As a test, I went back and reread countless student submissions. Beyond the fact that some students just completed more work than others, it was very difficult to tell who was an introvert, and who was an extrovert. While some responses were more verbose, or some videos more animated, these were not definitive indicators to me. Nearly unilaterality, students were sharing in ways that felt more natural, and less forced than my in person course prompts. I was curious enough to look up research on the matter and I found plenty of it.

Countless scientific studies and anecdotal accounts explain how the very aspects of the mask of anonymity that allows individuals to bully each other mercilessly on the internet, also allows students of online learning platforms to feel more comfortable participating; and sharing in greater depth. I went a step further to consider that since the course I taught was completely online, and that the students never had to meet physically in person, it may have created an even denser or nearly impenetrable wall of social immunity, whereby students could share with their peers and myself, without the vulnerability hangover that might accompany them should they have to actually physically appear in person and face one another at the next class meeting. In essence, I found that all students were sharing more, and in greater depth, and that the true introverts were nearly unrecognizable. I won’t go so far as to say it is the very same as cathartic confession, but I believe a distinct sense of Carl Rogers’s unconditional positive regard is at play.

Again, this is my first semester teaching a fully online class. At less than two months in, I still have a lot to learn about this new environment, and how students react to it, in the context of my particular subject which by nature is rife with opportunities for self reflection and self exposition. My sense, and research based inquiry thus far, leads me to believe that online learning platforms offer unique bastions of safety for students, both introverted and extroverted to reflect, mirror, see, be seen, or be deliciously unseen...in the intoxicating ethers of the internet.

Try This!

Name Coach

Research shows that pronouncing students' names correctly matters, and that starts with us modeling it. This article has a few concrete strategies too.

You may have noticed my NameCoach email signature, you can record yours for free here: NameCoach Personal Badge and easily add the link to Canvas, your email, or other messages.

Resources & Links

Did you know that you can caption live on the fly with Google Slides?! #gamechanger

A helpful post on Teaching Students how to Legally Use Images Online (and some great places to get images).

Last week I followed this Twitter thread of online ice breaker activities.

Conference Information

Can-Innovate