 I'm not quite sure is it good evening or good afternoon. It's a minute past five I've just been sitting here listen to Helen name drop there with No, absolutely. I'm really looking forward to this as someone who kind of attempts to try and blog from time to time and gets Flustered and and and gets overwhelmed by it For someone to actually talk about how how we can actually use it in terms of scholarship and sharing and I love to do The idea of annotations so so I'm really gonna be here But I might pick her up as well and and pull the rug for if she gets a little bit too big for a boost Joking aside, no listen One of the things I love about OER is meeting some great people so I'm really looking forward to this So if you're ready Helen in your own time Thank you so much. I am very happy to be stepping into this domain When I started Excuse me the PhD program two years ago. I I Started with some metaphors and crystallization was not one So I'm happy to share this one because this one has has emerged as I've done the PhD program to this point So here in Canada we recognize and acknowledge the Traditional and indigenous keepers of the land so I'd like to acknowledge those past present and future Generations of the indigenous nations here in the Windsor area where I teach and learn This is also your invitation to continue Crystallizing my thinking as I dip further into becoming an academic and scholar. I have been working very Consciously and intentionally as an open academic and as I as I move into the PhD program I used a claim a reclaim hosting blog site and Would like you to also join if you have a hypothesis group open for any Annotations for this presentation or you can leave a comment on the blog site as well So just to frame what I'm going to talk about today I would I I think about these color kaleidoscopic glasses and thinking about how I was looking through different colors and different lenses as I was going through the coursework and the Portfolio presentation looking at different frameworks ontologies epistemologies methodologies and methods and really learning and developing my Critical digital literacies as I worked through and navigated into open spaces So it was very challenging to think differently as I was working through the coursework And you'll see that evidenced on the open domain blog site that I have Labeled step-by-step because I'm taking this PhD program one step at a time and Realizing that it's a marathon and I'm only about halfway through when I presented my comprehensive portfolio I used the reclaim hosting Scalar instance to prepare my Portfolio and we'll take a look at that in a few minutes as well. It's called into the labyrinth So as I started the PhD program my very first Challenge was to risk my my own confidence at risk and and and buck up my confidence as you might say to Share things openly and in the very first course We had to do this assignment that shaped our story and what brought us to the PhD program and those Influencers in our work So I shared on my blog site and then submitted the link to my Instructor so that they could see see the work I had produced And I had a few comments and and conversations with the instructor after the fact as I continued into the program I spent some time with a book by Deborah Lupton Ingram Newton and Pat Thompson called the digital academic and In that came out with this notion of her palm numara and it comes out of Foucault's research and It talks about becoming who you are through this act of writing. So it's self-writing is and you become transformed by doing the writing and and I really Caught that and and I've been reframing and and Revisualizing this as I've gone into the program Because I think by writing in a blog site I I Consolidate and and not harden but really shape and crystallize my thinking about certain things and Make some some conscious decisions about what but what fits for me and what doesn't So I love having fun with fractals and and I'm a Glutton for watching videos about fluid fluids and fractals and ice flows and things like that and I think about all of the ideas and the Conceptions that I've I've struggled with as I go through this PhD program. So I started with auto ethnography. I Shifted to okay ethnography in a digital world and then well, maybe after I read Catherine Croman's work Research, maybe it's ground theory and well, maybe it's phenomenology. Well, am I really doing phenomenology? And then I read Chrissy Miran's PhD and oh, well, maybe it's phenomenography And so I struggled through all of these conceptions fluidly shifting through and finding my path to what I've discovered in Post phenomenology and you can read on the blog site how that happened So as as I continue to go through Completed the coursework and then had to go through this in in our program What we call the comprehensive portfolio defense. So it's similar to Indiva defense where you have to validate what you know and and say yes, I'm ready to do this research so again a conscious decision to Use scalar and that came through some conversations I had with Julia Forsythe who at Brock University Had already done some some playing around with scalar So she encouraged me to step off the edge and jump into it and scalar because of the The media and digital literacy component of my research really fits for what I wanted to accomplish And for those who haven't seen scalar, I'm just going to very quickly Just share the So for my committee, I had to prepare I'm a video so I've shared the video but first for within scalar you have this navigation ability To pick your own pathway to pick your own way through a document So I structured the document very differently than a flat linear PDF File and shared this with my committee members so you can see that all of the pages in the document are Are highlighted Sections of the document are highlighted and you can drill down to each of the individual pages and click on that And it will link you to that page in the document that I created So all the pathways so as a as the author of this document I could strategically select pathways for the for my committee members or my readers to look at the document and Each of these pathways has a name and has specific links to pages within the document itself I was able to incorporate a vast collection of media files And you'll see through the presentation that I do a lot of graphic visualizations as a way to kind of form formalize consolidate my thinking crystallize my thinking as you will and and I was able to include those specifically on pages and and within pathways Okay, so that's the basics of What scale are does and I'll let you take a look at the video at your leisure So as I come to this point where I'm ready to do my research I needed to crystallize my conceptual understanding and This again became a process of of almost a year of thinking and rethinking and and trying to figure out so Landed on a notion that started with Laura Laura Richardson and ended up with Laura Alling said in 20 now in 2009 and she wrote this book called in Engaging crystallization in qualitative research and in this she wrote what I envisioned my my research to look like and feel like for me With my media and digital literacy background with my focus on teacher education With my passion for open education and sharing in global contexts so Ellison talks about crystallization as as beyond the the binary and and breaking cross boundaries and Multiple forms of representation so taking information and finding Breaking it outside of the the text alpha as I say alpha numeric text Boundaries and and looking at different ways of visualizing and sharing it through video through image through icon through audio So as a result of this I've crystallized my thinking about crystallization as as a way of Doing my research of doing the scholarly work that I'm doing and Ellison breaks it into different forms She talks about integrated or dendritic She talks about the epistemological structures underneath it the ontology Ontologies that that you bring into the research. She talks about how it ties neatly into different methodologies like Grounded theory as an example or ethnography as an example and And it really ties for me into my conceptualization of of things that that are Deer to my research in terms of media making and and dual coding and semiotics and Discourse analysis so those are pieces that are are built into this conceptualization of what crystallization can do and different ways that I can share But also ways to analyze data and analyze The the information that comes from the participants in the research So this is a brand new visualization and again, I'd love to see to hear some feedback on that And I continue to negotiate and I will continue to negotiate I may say that I'm crystallizing But you know, we all know that the like the snow that fell last night Snowflakes will continue to fall and will continue to crystallize. It is not a an end game I know that there will be an end game for the PhD. There will be a Viva presentation There will be a finished document that will be the crystallized But I know that everything else continues it doesn't doesn't ever really end as an academic and and I'm always Negotiating as I went into blogging and doing scale are making really critical intentional decisions About where I was going open public formal informal Where I was engaging with community where I was doing things independently or or Dynamically and this is one of those sessions that that I hope will inform my practice a little bit more So I'll can continue through your active participation and hopefully through the comments and the hypothesis annotations Just consider this as your opportunity to influence my PhD directions And and come play come play with some crystals with me As I shift from fluidity to some some form of solidity Solidarity in solidarity from clothes to open It requires that I let go of some things and it requires that I become what I might be And I appreciate your presence in this PhD journey. So thank you Can I just say a round of applause? Absolutely. I hope in your virtual rounds of applause Helen I've been sitting here thinking oh my god. My doctor was so boring I Treasure it was absolutely brilliant. I agree Laura Gibson. I really want to play with this decision continuum Absolutely that the level of genuine open scholarship and inventiveness and innovative and sharing that journey I'm genuinely sitting here. I Have to say that I am only stepping in the footsteps of the Giants who have gone before me. I I actively am supported by people like Doug Belchal or Gojia Bonnie Stewart Catherine Cronin and so many more as Examples of what's what's possible and and still having these open conversations with the goji and network folks that Really inspire and and keep me going. Yeah, that's absolutely. I'm always very ambious about the goji and Network, but I cannot if to say if you're talking about following in footsteps I tell you you're putting down some pretty impressive Footprints yourself Helen. I'm making it really really is like that Here when the breeze is saying these tools and metaphors can really help open up explorations beyond our usual reductive approaches And I think yeah, I'm in it while while writing those open up stuff and get cognitive juices going Do you find that sort of visual approach? Gets gets it in a way that writing might get suppose I think it does because There are so many people that could be writing in a particular area like ethnography or in my case I'm really digging into this post phenomenology Space and I can pull the threads and ideas together in a visualization that that would otherwise stay Isolated they would they wouldn't they there's no way to pull them together and say ah That's what they're talking about and there's the link and that's how these these ideas connect Yeah Martina MK we said, how do you know when a tart or an idea is crystallized? When I can say aha, I get it Aha Now I get it. So then it's crystallized and then it's it's it's whether whether the crystal is added to we know that snowflakes and Crystals keep adding in some cases, but but it's that that initial aha that it makes sense to me Have you had lots of oh no moments as well as a ha moments No, I was going down the whole wrong path You know, yes, yeah, Leo have my sense it reminds me of threshold concepts Yes, and thank you to Leo for for bringing that one into my my my whole crystal image Definitely, it's it's there as well. Yeah, what's the book you talked about the crystal book? Was that a ha moment? Absolutely was so and it came out of Some some research Where I was reading Laura Richardson and I really liked the the idea of crystallization They just caught my attention and then I started looking for well Is there something has had to have have been done since 2003 when she was first first introduced it So yeah, I went looking and found Laura Allen Ellington's work and she's written some some recent things that I'm digging into right now See Leo glad you glad you like the stuff I can certainly see as someone who lectures and research matters I can see you getting lots of invoices Ellen Your stocks because I think it's trying to get that that journey I think for me what really strikes is is your willingness to engage and be You know, you're not just you truly are an open researcher and you're willing to kind of go I was a phenomenologist. No, I wasn't a phenomenologist. I was a crowned a theorist and That's that's not always an easy because I think one of the problems I think when you when you read someone's thesis For someone who's new to research they think that this was a beautiful sequential journey, you know, they started at the introduction of and You're willing to to share that the messiness And that again was a real risk. So I Struggle and I still struggle with that in terms of The imposter syndrome that comes with it and then who am I to be talking about that because I don't know anything about post phenomenology And and I don't know anything about grounded theory. So why should I be writing in my blog about it? But isn't it that that willingness to do because everybody feels an imposter So I've a very few actually come out and and and and say it and I'm I'm so looking forward to here when you do your boy, but which I'm sure you would be doing and very soon I mean for that does sort of bring back. I mean Nick in some ways is the traditional research When all we talk with the other Interesting ways and yet we still reduce it to medieval technology bits of cardboard and paper Yeah, you know, it's It's quite limiting isn't it has to load beyond that. Yeah Yeah, and that's that's for my media and digital literacy background digital Technologies fluencies, I'm pushing that boundary Perfect It's anybody one final question. I'm just watching the time here I know I could sit and listen to Helen all day and I know I'm gonna be bothering her in the future there like that So no, absolutely. I mean you talk about when you go to conferences and I know I keep saying it I'm sorry, but genuinely how we are is it's a place that's Somewhere a little bit special a little bit different and you have to my mind Typify that so if we're happy enough that we've gone a little bit over our time It just people just want to join and applause again in the chat functions and stuff and just once again Helen just to say You stole the show as far as I'm concerned brilliant. Thank you so much for those kind words not at all. It's only the truth so Thanks Helen it was as mind-boggling as they expected look forward to it probably in your journey Yeah, I think a lot of people will be will be following We'll be following that journey So, yeah, lots of loads of applause here. Yeah, Christina. Yeah, Leo loads and not just one They're getting two and trees there like that. So it's really really good Lorda games. Go go go Helen Okay Not at all. I think it's certainly a lot of love and affection and you know, as I said, that's come across I am I don't know Deb is behind the scene now. I don't know. I'm just I'm just the monkey at the front She's the organ grinder. Yeah Okay, well, I'm good at that was brilliant Helen I love listening to you and I was absolutely thrilled to be part of this So I'm gonna play Brian Mathes' lovely funky video and then we're all done. Excellent. Well done. Thanks everyone Hmm