This summer, I dared myself to complete a Master's Degree online in one year. Of all the anxieties I anticipated - balancing working and studying, difficulty of content, sufficient technology knowledge - I never anticipated that writing on a discussion board would be a source of both anxiety and perception of success (or lack thereof).
As a linguist, I have always been fascinated by how verbal communication differs from written communication. In my written communication, I use formal speech, complex sentences, and well structured paragraphs. In speech, I am insistent, persuasive, and often sarcastic. In a classroom environment, I ask a lot of questions, and am unafraid to be wrong, willing to take risks when arguing my point. On the written discussion board, I am hesitant, wondering if my point is being perceived as I wrote it, or if the reader is missing my point altogether. I am constantly muttering to myself: "Am I rambling?"; "Is anyone reading this?"; "Do I sound like an idiot?"
Despite all this anxiety, I seem to be scoring the points for the discussion board. However, I don't feel like I am learning. I don't have the benefit of nonverbal language I would receive in a F2F situation to determine if I am on the right track, nor do I get much individual feedback from the professors. On the other hand, there are certain students whose posts are interesting to me. I do not know my classmates very well, but I do think it is possible that some students would not be as willing to speak as clearly and with so much detail in a F2F situation.
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