This week was very interesting, particularly due to the fact that I was in charge of a synchronous and asynchronous facilitation. This was quite the eye-opening experience, having to be on the other end of the online classroom. I thought that the preparation aspect of the presentation went very well, as with anything, the more prepared you are, the better off you'll be. However, once the presentation actually began, the nerves set in. At first I was very nervous, not sure if anyone would actually participate. Although, as my students (typically peers) did a great job of fostering the conversation, the classroom pretty much ran itself. The one thing that I was much more aware of, being on the facilitator side, was that time flies. I had my own ideas of how to relegate the conversation, based on certain time checkpoints, but my class had such good ideas, it was hard to stop them from expressing their ideas.
As far as the asynchronous facilitation is concerned, I believe that so far, things are going very well. I have been trying to make sure that I keep up with all of the comments on a day-by-day basis (for the most part), which makes it easy for me to monitor the flow of the conversation. It's quite interesting to see how all of the different perspectives create a cornucopia of diverse ideas.
This exercise was certainly a great way to experience what it is to facilitate in an online setting.
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