| Wednesday, July 18, 2007 |
| Training through the Web |
Summer is an opportune time for educators, like me, to learn about and experiment with new teaching tools. Since the end of the Spring term, I have done research on classroom response systems (specifically i>clicker) and networked classroom control systems (such as SchoolVue). I found that most vendors of these systems offer the convenience of Webinars to familiarize potential customers with their products. Web conferencing is a real-time medium for company representatives to connect with customers, providing a way for customers to experience and ask questions about the products.  I have also been experimenting with Macromedia Captivate to create training video clips, demonstrating how to do a variety of tasks in the Learning Management System at KWC. These clips are a few minutes in length and can be downloaded at the user's convenience. I plan to develop a library of "QuickTip Clips" to use in the place of or in addition to printed step-by-step instructions. After briefly sharing what I learned about creating mini-movies with Captivate, one of the faculty members began using it in his online class to show his statistics students how to do Microsoft Excel laboratory exercises. With the course being mostly asynchronous, the students have commented that the video clips proved very helpful in understanding the procedures and being able to complete the assignments. He plans to provide the clips for future face-to-face classes, as a resource for struggling or absent students. Labels: online learning, technology in the workplace |
posted by SG @ 3:51 PM   |
|
|
|
| Monday, June 18, 2007 |
| Online Teaching Reflections |
 I just finished teaching a five week summer online educational technology course. As mentioned in the previous post, it was my first experience with teaching online. There were some significant benefits to the online format - flexibility of time and space, accessibility to materials, and increased student responsibility. I also liked being able to archive class interactions through e-mail, chat, and discussion boards; because of this, I felt that I was able to give more specific feedback on course content, assignments, and other class activities.
Some students struggled at the beginning of the course with adjusting to the online format; most of these students worked out these adjustments and were successful in the course. Some students hit the ground running, completing many assignments and tests ahead of the course schedule; a few of these students lost steam towards the end of the course and finished poorly. While I have seen similar trends in the face-to-face environment, I think that overall some students will find the online format more suitable to their style of learning than others.
In reflection of this teaching online experience, I think one of the most important elements that made it a positive one is communication. All communication between myself and students and among the students was text-based. Knowing this, I attempted to make all my communications with the students clear and redundant. I posted weekly pop-up announcements, e-mailed copies of these announcements to the students, and mentioned them in the weekly chat sessions. I used bulleted and numbered lists in announcements and assignments. Even though assignment due dates were posted on the syllabus and in the assignment information areas, I reminded students of these due dates in the announcements as well. In the chat sessions, I wrote informally and used a different text color to distinguish my comments from the others. I tried to define terms in my writing that may have been unfamiliar to the students. I created graphic headers for each week's announcement, so that students could quickly recognize when a new announcement had been posted.
The students who were successful often asked questions during the chat sessions or through e-mail to clarify assignment requirements, lesson content, and test questions. Because I could not sense confusion through non-verbal signals, as I would in the face-to-face environment, it was up to the students to ask questions when they were confused or unclear about course matters. When one student would ask a question during a chat session, oftentimes other students would comment that they were wondering the same thing.Labels: online learning |
| posted by SG @ 11:00 AM |
|
|
|
| Wednesday, June 13, 2007 |
| What to do with emerging technologies... |
In reading "Another Life: Virtual Worlds as Tools for Learning," the writers posed the following rhetorical question to the educational community concerning the use of MUVEs like Second Life in education:
"What can this technology do that will enhance the learner's experience that my current learning technology portfolio cannot?"
Some of the answers the authors came up with include a new sense of self, the death of distance, the ability to practice, increased collaboration, and enhanced experience. I think this question can be aptly applied to other emerging instructional technology areas, such as Web 2.0 and online learning, as well. What do these newer technologies offer that enhance teaching and learning?
This summer, I taught an online undergraduate educational technology course for the first time. Throughout the semester, I found myself asking a variation of the above question, "How can I best utilize the online platform to teach this course?" While the objectives of the course stayed the same as in previous semesters of teaching it face-to-face, I modified my teaching methods and learning activities to better accomplish these objectives in the online environment.
 One activity that went very well involved the use of teams. The course is run on the IntraLearn course management system which has a Teams feature that places students in cooperative groups and provides them with group chat rooms and discussion boards. I assigned the task of completing a WebQuest about WebQuests. Because the students collaborated online, I was able to view the chat session archives and discussion boards to observe how the teams accomplished the assignment. I think that the online format was more time efficient as students from several states and varying schedules came together synchronously and asynchronously to work together.Labels: MUVE, online learning, SecondLife, Web 2.0 |
| posted by SG @ 3:29 PM |
|
|
|
|
| About Me |
|
|
| Previous Items |
|
| Archives |
|
|
| About This Blog |
| I am attempting to develop practical instructional applications of developing technologies and provide educators with tools to implementing instructional technologies effectively. |
| Research Interests |
MUVEs, Web 2.0, assistive technologies, digital video |
| Links |
|
|
| Template by |
|
|
