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Last month, Project New Media Literacies attended the second annual Digital Media and Learning Conference in Long Beach, CA. The conference is an inclusive, international gathering of scholars and practitioners in the field, focused on fostering interdisciplinary and participatory dialog, as well as linking theory, empirical study, policy, and practice.

On the first day of the conference, Project NML presented a workshop called "Exploring the Characteristics of Participatory Learning". This workshop explored five "characteristics" that NML has recognized as central to creating successful participatory learning environments. The list emerged as a result of our experience running a pilot professional development program with a group of early adopters from New Hampshire last year. The PD asked these k-8  public school educators, "What would the integration of the new media literacies across curricula look like?" "How could you integrate these skills to foster new practices into your own classrooms and schools?" Also, "How will you spread it, and sustain it?" Based on the varied ways the PD succeeded and failed, the final question we were left with was probably the first one we should have asked: "What are the ingredients of a participatory culture of learning,  and what are the practices that help build and sustain it?" Since then, this is the question our research group has set out to answer.

A little more about the perils and promises of participatory PD that we encountered during our experience with New Hampshire... The year-long program was a blended model of learning (part in-person, part online). Due to a 3,000 mile separation between the instructor (me) and the participants (NH) the course required about 80% online participation, and only 20% face-to-face time. The idea was to offer the educators opportunities to practice the skill set of the new media literacies themselves as learners before integrating them in their practice as educators. Our goal by engaging educators in digitally-connected, asynchronous forms of collaborative learning was that they would gain an organic, authentic understanding of what we (NML) mean by "participatory culture" - and thereby adopt the value of its practices and bring them to their students and districts.