CCT Glossary

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Bongo

A philosophy of supplementing student education through continued involvement of alumni in their learning experiences, as well as supporting continued alumni education through their involvement of the education of current students. (See CCTNetwork page.)

CCDE

Refers to the Division of Corporate, Continuing, and Distance Education office at UMass-Boston, which manages class offerings and registration for students not formally involved in degree programs but instead seeking continued learning experiences. The exception is that the office also manages all shorter summer and winter term classes, a number of which are actually part of the CCT program. (See the CCDE home page).

CCT (or CCT Program)

Critical and Creative Thinking. May refer to the CCT graduate program in the Graduate College of Education at UMass-Boston, but this also may refer to the more general idea of critical and creative thinking. The actual definitions of "critical thinking", "creative thinking", and "critical and creative thinking" are possibly open to interpretation, and perhaps exploring what these mean is part of the experience of being a student (or other associate) of the CCT program. (See the CCT home page).

CCT Forum

This is the formal name of a Recognized Professional Association (RPA) at UMass-Boston, which is a graduate student-based organization that has been officially approved and sanctioned by the Graduate Student Assembly. This particular RPA is maintained by the CCT program. All RPAs are open to all graduate students by university rule, but generally the CCT Forum is composed of those students enrolled in the CCT M.A. or Certificate programs, who are considered to be members upon matriculating into the program.

CCT Network

Developed over the 2007-08 academic year, this is the name of the effort to create an ongoing and sustainable community of all people who have some connection to the CCT Program. These might include past, present, and incoming students, alumni, faculty, adjunct professors, instructors, program staff, and other friends and partners of the program. This community is to serve as a point of connection and support for ongoing professional and personal development, sharing of work, innovations, and any other ideas, and developing the ways in which we can be resources for each other as well as learn from each other. Some more tangible elements of the CCT Network include special monthly events and electronic resources for sharing of information, news, and written discussion. (See the CCT Network).

Creative Thinking

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Critical Thinking

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Dialogue

A special way to hold conversation in which mutual sharing and respect provide a foundation of individual expression while also allowing for the emergence of collective meaning that comes from the wisdom of the group. Spontaneous, and without detailed agendas, Dialogue involves the creation of a "space" where sincere reflection and unpolished statements are allowed and may help new truths to surface. (See an explanation of the Dialogue process.)

Diigo

A free, web-based resource for allowing you to annotate web pages and save them so that whenever you visit the page, you can see past notes that you wrote, share pages and your notes with others, and create lists of "bookmarks" or "favorites" pages that can be shared publicly, instead of just inside of your own web browser. This is one of the available tools on the CCT "ning". (Visit www.diigo.com).

Ning

The short name of the web site www.ning.com, a web-based resource for creating social networks. The site includes tools for creating blog entries, sharing photos, writing reflections, and other types of online interactions that are meant to support face-to-face and person-to-person connections that might be cultivated through involvement with the CCT Network. Referring to "the ning" generally means specifically the social networking web site of the CCT Network. (Visit cctnetwork.ning.com).

Reflective Practice

The idea that someone who is seeking to create change may take risks and experiment in putting ideas into practice (in work or life), then through observation and discussion, evaluate the results and revise the approaches accordingly. Sometimes mentioned in relation to the formation of the Reflective Practice Group, an earlier inspiration for the current CCT Network.

Skype

A web-based resource and software program for making phone calls through an Internet connection (via a microphone and headphones/speakers). Because the service works through the Internet, costs are extremely low for international calls and domestic calls, and free for calls to other people who also use Skype. (Visit www.skype.com).

Synthesis

Often refers to the CCT course "Synthesis of Theory and Practice" (CRCRTH 694), the final (required) course of the CCT M.A. degree. Also may be referenced as the name of the written product that is created by students during the Synthesis of Theory and Practice course. The written Synthesis must adhere to formal university and program standards and be submitted in proper form before graduation is permitted. Although at times it may be compared to a thesis or dissertation and some similarities might exist, these terms are not synonymous.

Talkshoe

A web-based resource for hosting and recording live conference calls, allowing participation by a large group of people using a combination of standard phone calls and Internet-based calls. Often used for calls involving the CCT Network. (See the CCT Network talkshoe page to hear recordings of past calls).

Web CT

A web-based resource for developing, organizing, and managing online courses, owned by the company Blackboard. Supports the use of a number of different kinds of online tools to create the experience of a virtual classroom, particularly for universities and other institutions that have established a distance-learning option for coursework. This has been used by UMass-Boston and CCT courses offered online. (Visit www.webct.com/webct/).

Wiki

Generally, this is a collection of web pages that allows people to edit information directly and create new information that can be modified by multiple people. The information may relate to any topic of interest to a group of people. Because editing pages on a wiki web site does not require the specialized knowledge usually needed to design web pages, pages can be changed quickly and easily, allowing for the development of online content that can evolve through collaboration between many people. A page may be edited to add or remove information, which might make it more precise, eliminate unproven or uncertain statements, or allow a broader range of perspectives to be represented. This term may often more specifically refer to the CCT Wiki, a set of pages on the web site formerly maintained in the Wikispaces site, now no longer active. This CCT Glossary is an example of a wiki page - anyone who has access to edit the CCT Wiki may change definitions here. Wikis usually involve an explicit or implicit agreement that people will change information in "good faith", meaning that a sincere effort will be made to ensure that only accurate, qualified statements are present. (Visit www.cct.umb.edu).

Wimba

A web-based resource that complements online course software such as Web CT by offering additional options for voice and video communication and generally increasing the way that online collaboration occurs. (Visit www.wimba.com).

Wiser

The common name of the UMass-Boston web site for allowing students to register for classes and checking student account and billing information. The user ID for the system usually follows the pattern UMSxxxxxxxx, where the x's are numbers, and this is assigned by the university administration upon enrollment. (Visit wiser.umb.edu).