Online Role-play -
a beginner’s perspective

The Early Childhood professional needs to have a multitude of skills, behaviours and attitudes in order to be an effective problem solver, leader and most importantly I believe, advocate for young children.

These skills are not usually acquired from ‘content’. A teacher just simply presenting knowledge in a traditional classroom may be providing knowledge but not necessarily changing attitudes. Australian Early Child Professionals are increasingly being challenged to provide inclusive environments. Many of the behaviours and attitudes to children and families that we practiced, even up to five years ago, are now no longer considered acceptable. For example care of young children is seen much more as a partnership between the child care professional and the parent. The parent is not only considered to be the ‘expert’ on their child but needs to be encouraged to be a genuine partner in the child’s learning.

Professionals who enable children and parents, as well as colleagues, to be powerful partners in the process of constructing the child’s experience in a children’s service create a genuine learning community.

Stonehouse (2002) p 37

This is certainly a very different view point from when I began my teaching career nearly 20 years ago. At that stage, the teacher was the ‘expert’ and guided the learning experience. In order for students to acquire some of the competencies needed to be an effective partner with all families and colleagues, I believe they need to be immersed in situations that will help change and develop attitudes.

How does this all link to role-play? When deciding what to put in my part of this keynote, I had to reflect on my attitudes to and knowledge of role-play. As far as role-play goes I see myself as a babe in the woods. I am extremely reluctant to use role-play in the classroom in a face-to-face (f2f) situation. I always found them contrived and find that my students usually demonstrate what I’m telling them I expect to see. My perception after being involved in adult education now for 10 years, is that many students perceive role-play as ‘acting’ so they can act and react in ways they perhaps wouldn’t in real life contexts. How do I know this? Usually by watching students in their interactions while on work placement, or even after they have graduated. They often do not show the behaviours and skills they can so clearly demonstrate on paper or in f2f role-play. Basically, I’ve got to the stage that I never use role-play in face-to-face situations.

However the online role-play is a completely different ball game. The anonymity plus extended time frame of the whole experience allows you to become immersed in the character in a way you do not seem to be able to do in a f2f class. The opportunity to reflect throughout the role-play gives participants the opportunity to truly develop attitudes and have beliefs and attitudes challenged.

Designer as Learner – experience as a role-play participant

In 2002, I was introduced to online role-play. I participated in three different types of role-plays and also had the opportunity to design a role-play based on the Galactic Wormhole email role-play template. I will explain this one a little later.

1. Forum-based role-play

In 2002 I was a student in the Graduate Certificate in Facilitating and Managing e-Learning (FAMe), a nine month course that introduces learners to all major aspects of online facilitation. Within the module ‘Communication Online (COL) – Online Feedback’ I was engaged in a role-play where I needed to respond to a learner’s concerns or issues within the forum.

The first role-play was a situation where four students had supposedly put comments/questions. Each FAMe participant then had to choose one of these virtual students and respond to their comments. The ‘virtual student’ then replied back to each of us with almost another question or more complex situation as does happen in real life. I then had to reply. In this experience I was role-playing myself in that I was able to practice my facilitation skills on a fictitious student, but got a real response back. Because I couldn’t actually see the person (i.e. another of my peers in a f2f class) I certainly felt that it was more real.

Click here to read my debriefing of this role-play

2. Persona of fictitious student

Another role-play exercise was to take on the persona of a fictitious student within an email spam exercise. The aim of this role-play was to demonstrate spam to participants and get them to think of ways of dealing with spam. I found that it was great fun for the role players, but the rest of the people who got all our spam were less than amused. The facilitators received a number of complaints.

3. Needle Stick – Web-based roleplay

My first extended role-play was within the role-play Needle Stick which was facilitated by Kate Fannon.

Needle Stick was designed and developed in the Fablusi™ learning environment for an action learning research project in 2002 to investigate goal-based elearning in a role-play simulation which modelled a complex social system. It dealt with the issues surrounding the operation of a Needle Exchange Program in close proximity to a school in a provincial city. This learning strategy is highly immersive and engages the learners by placing them as agents of the activity rather than as reactors to content. Given a scenario, the goals of private and public agendas in each role-profile and the published public profiles of other roles, participants must negotiate solutions in collaboration with those they form alliances.

Fannon (2002) p 4

In Needle Stick I had taken on the role of the Principal, Bernard Knowles. Bernard had two agendas within the role-play. His public agenda was to foster debate around the issue of a Needle Exchange Program (NEP), his private agenda was that he found the whole issue repugnant and wanted to get the Needle Exchange Program as far away from the school as possible.

Within this role-play I had the opportunity to try a variety of strategies that I would have to use in real life such as strategic questioning, trying to lead an unwilling group and dealing with people with very diverse public and private agendas. It was also very interesting to have to argue an opposite view to which I actually felt. What impact does this have on the learner? What did I learn? And more interestingly why didn’t I feel that this could happen in a f2f situation?

I found that as I was immersed in the role-play, my knowledge, understanding and persona became much more complex and ‘bigger’. The following is my journey through role-play.

Getting used to the technology
The first challenge for me was learning new technical skills.

Two technology platforms were used for the Needle Stick role-play:

• WebCT for initial pre-role-play instructions, inductions, introductions, debriefing
• Fablusi™ for the actual role -play

Being used to another learning platform, I found WebCT quite a bit different. However, being a bit of a clicker, I just clicked around until I figured out how to do it. The limitations of the technology can be very discouraging, but at the same time the sense of accomplishment when I figured out how to do it was very satisfying. This is of course a huge consideration for facilitators. If students are not familiar with the technology it adds that extra dimension of stress. In a f2f situation you have someone there who can answer questions immediately. But on the downside you have an audience which always gives role-play that element of acting.

The Fablusi™ software was the next hurdle for me. In a debriefing document I submitted as part of the FAMe course, I made the following comments:

• Frustrated at the way the program was actually set up. Not being able to edit or proofread was very annoying. If you forgot the subject line, you couldn’t go back.
• Overwhelmed at the sheer number of threads in some of the forums like Street Talk. Found it really hard to find the time to read them all thoroughly. Not being able to expand all messages was a real pain. It would have saved me heaps of time being able to do this.
• Lost in the software

At one point I had to meet another person in the chat room. My comments in regards to this experience were “I met R in the chat room on a Saturday. The actual chat was very painful. The screen kept refreshing and I’d lose my place and have to start again.”

Because of the role-play I got to go to my first internet café. It was really interesting as all the instructions were in Korean. Had to remember which button to hit.

Implications for design
All of these initial difficulties could have led to several different outcomes. I persevered because I was interested and needed to complete because I was using the experience as a project for FAMe. I feel I have quite competent computer skills. Many of my students do not. They would need to be taken through the environment is great detail before they would be able to interact within it.

Getting started

• Who am I within this role-play?
• How do I express this to everyone else?

Once I had grappled with the technology and learnt how to navigate around the environment. I then needed to come to terms with who I was within this role-play and how do I express this to everyone else? I find online communication is so much more public than in other environments. You put something on the screen and everyone can read it. Questions like, do I make sense, are they going to think I’m an idiot, what is the right thing to say in this situation all kept going through my head.

Staying in character was at times difficult. Unfortunately my real life kept getting in the way. I had to remember not to give away who I was by giving information that would put me in context, eg. I think I said in one of the discussions that I was taking the year 6 kids on an excursion so wouldn’t be around much. The only other person I knew in the simulation was working with me on another project and because of this knew that I was actually going to Sydney on an excursion with my Diploma 2 students. It obviously wasn’t a great leap for her to figure out who I was. I know I almost gave it away another time by mentioning I was going to Sydney, which would have told everyone that I was probably one of the NSW people.

I felt that I had very formal role that conflicted with private/public persona. As the leader of the school I found myself grappling with a very formal role. My perception of ‘the headmaster’ influenced my interpretation. This also combined with the fact that when I’m unsure I do tend to become very formal and try to ensure I do it by the book so to speak. I felt that many of the others seemed much more relaxed and comfortable within the roles.

Who am I in this role-play community?

• Who am I in this community? Where do I fit?
• What is my role?
• How do I interact with the others in this community?
• Who are they?

Once I had established in my mind who I was in this role-play, I then had to let everyone else know. I did this initially by writing a description based on the information I had been given about my public and private persona. In setting my public persona I needed to write an introductory document that everyone could read. It was great that some of the people had been in role-plays previously so got there documents up there first which gave me a great model. This took away some of the scariness.

I felt very strongly that I needed to make a good impression. What I had failed to consider here is that some of the others had been given information about me, which had an impact on how my character was received. The more I think about it, the more I realise that this is what happens in real life.

Becoming part of the community was very difficult. I like to be part of the crowd, but found it difficult to do so in this situation. The street talk was so big and confronting that I found it took a long time to get into it. These people seemed to be so at ease with the whole thing, especially Simmo, who I now know was in her fourth simulation and found that this worked the best.

The position I had in the role-play (Principal of the school) left me feeling a little isolated. I found I didn’t really have anyone to turn to for advice. I was pretty much out there on my own. The staff appeared to have taken over the P&C forum rather than the staff room, which I found quite disconcerting. They had privately decided between themselves that I was of little consequence (due to the information given to them at the start) and thus I had to learn and utilise skills to help motivate and draw together essentially an unwilling team.

Problem Solving

• How do I get across my message to the community?
• How do I reveal my agenda within this character?
• How do I facilitate the overall goal of this role-play?

One I had figured out who Bernard was I then had to navigate my way around the whole role-play. We had a problem to solve which initially was a little unclear certainly to me. I found I went in and out of different rooms feeling initially in the dark. I was reluctant to post again in case people thought I was a twit or worse. I really wanted to be sure I was putting up the ‘right’ answer or statement. This is one of the main reasons I really embraced the idea of fostering debate within the community (my public agenda). By asking the questions in the P & C forum I was able to gauge people’s issues and concerns without having to make any statements of my own. Once I was sure that I was working in the best interests of the school and community I found then I was able to be more forthright and make more of a stand.

Determining people’s hidden agenda’s was an area that I really felt I failed miserably at. I’m pretty much an open book. What you see is what you get. I tend to say what I think and try to stand up for my beliefs. However I am realising more and more many people do not do this. As the principal of the school I also had a hidden agenda that I don’t think I managed to convey to the group. I was violently opposed to the whole needle exchange program but personally felt in the position I was in I was unable to express it publicly. I tried to do this by fostering debate within the community. This was one of Bernard’s core roles. He was very keen to do this and did it quite well. I don’t know that it got anyone anywhere though. Because of this I was able to practice strategic questions. This is a personal goal of mine (Margaret not Bernard). I went to this great workshop based on the work of Fran Peavey that demonstrated the use of strategic questions. I’m trying to use them within my work and personal contexts. (Work seems to be easier than home I have to say). One of the first questions to ask rather than ‘Why don’t you agree’ is ‘what concerns you most about this issue’. It cuts to the central core of the matter. I was asked at thedebrief why I didn’t sign the petition (a petition to stop the needle exchange program. The major reason for this was that it would have given away my private agenda very publicly very early on.

Designer as Learner – the learning experience

• What skills do I need to be able to be true to my role?
• What did I learn at the different stages of this journey?

The skills needed to be a successful role-play participant according to the gospel of Margaret are:

• Being willing to give it a go.
• Being persistent even if the technology is driving you nuts.
• Get outside your comfort zone.
• Getting in there and participating. Time was always an issue for me. In some ways I felt a little like a ‘junkie’, - kept having to sneak away from my real life so that I could get my ‘fix’ of the role-play.
• The ability to ‘get into’ someone else’s life and think how they would react. What would they say? How would they deal with this situation? You actually need to be able to put your money where your mouth is. You need to be able to use your imagination.
• Find something you would like to practice – be it strategic questioning, being more/less assertive or whatever and use the situation to help with your own personal communication skills.

What did I learn?

• People's hidden agendas are not always easy to ascertain
• Lots goes on behind the scenes that you may not be aware of
• Role play is a valuable teaching/learning tool
• Need to have the time to commit to the role play
• The difficulties of trying to communicate with people out of context. Just suddenly plunged into a world may have limited knowledge about. Found it very difficult being so isolated. Not having a 'higher authority to call on' or even directives to look at.

Click here to read the full debriefing document from my perspective

Where to from here?

I hope to go on to bigger and brighter things. I would like to be involved in more role-play. I would like to find a way of using it with f2f students with the anonymity and extended time frames. I’m unsure how it would go and if they could refrain from talking about it and making alliances outside of the online environment. However, I find the so called ‘soft skills’ are the hardest to ‘teach.’ I could see application in a number of modules associated with inclusive practices and aboriginal families. These modules and others focus on attitudes and beliefs.

The benefits of being a designer as learner

Several years ago I was a ‘content expert’ for a children’s services online course. While designing the learning experiences for this course, I tried very hard to ensure that they were interactive. Now in hindsight, I can look at the experiences I designed as say they were interactive. But only within the technology. There was very little learner interaction. Now having been a participant in a number of different online experiences including web based role-play and the Graduate Certificate in Facilitating and Managing e-Learning, I firmly believe that designers need to be learners first and foremost. By being immersed in the learning experience, you can see what is working and what isn’t. I found the experiences that required me to work and collaborate with other learners certainly stand out in my mind much more than some of the purely read/write exercise. Thus if I had my time again, role-play, interactive forums and chats would feature much more widely in my content.

References

Fannon, K., (2002) A role-play simulation, transformative learning in complex dynamic social systems, Supervised Project 1 FET5660_2002S2 University of Southern Queensland.

Stonehouse, A., (2002) NSW Curriculum Framework for Children’s Services, the practice of relationships, essential provisions for children’s services, Department of Community Services, Sydney