Synthesis Reflection
Precis of Flight Path:
I began ETEC 565 with some experience with learning management systems as well as some experience with programs such as flash and dreamweaver. At the beginning of the course I wanted to continue to learn new tricks in these programs and make new discoveries with moodle. Specifically, I was interested in developing moodle within second life. To me, this would have been the next step in my learning. Unfortunately, due to course restrictions, I was not able to try this, but I did become more familiar with moodle.
I was also pursuing a better understanding of assessment, social software, and multimedia. Chickering and Gamson’s Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education and Bates and Poole’s (2003) Framework for Selecting and Using Technology will be very useful in implementing multimedia and social software in the furure. These readings may also be applied to improve assessment in the online environment. Largely, however, my thirst for becoming a better online test creator has not been quenched. There are some things in my flight path that I have still not resolved, yet ETEC 565 has given me the direction to resolve them.
Reflection on Toolkit Activities:
The e-learning toolkit activities were a very enlightening component of the course. They were very fun because it gave us a chance to play with the tools. Pedagogically, it makes the most sense to learn from playing. The moodle toolkit was especially beneficial as it walked us through such aspects as making forums which was important for successfully creating a good course within moodle. Comparing the different LMSs was also very interesting. It allowed me to see that there are not too many differences in the systems. There are some variations in the systems, but they all successfully carry out the functions that you would want a LMS to carry out. This prompted me to think why an institution or an individual would pay for an LMS such as Vista when they could use an open source one such as Moodle for much less the cost.
There were a few tools that were particularly interesting for me. The DVD authoring toolkit was very useful to me. I did not think to introduce a lot of video to my own teaching, but upon completion of this activity along with the discussion that followed, I believe that I have discovered the benefits of DVD authoring. Although I didn’t have time to implement DVD authoring or videos into my LMS, the toolkit activities made me think about how I should be selecting my tools for my course. This line of thinking that permits me to select the best tools for a course will no doubt help me in my future endeavors.
There were activities such as synchronous communication tools in the toolkit that I was quite familiar. I have developed a good level of how these tools worked so I did not feel the need to do the activities and reflect upon them in my weblog. Reading through the activities made me realize that my abilities were at par or greater than what was being demonstrated. I only wish that I had such activities when I was first starting out.
Applying SECTIONS to self-assess my e-portfolio:
Assessing my e-Portfolio using the Bates and Poole (2003) SECTIONS model was an excellent way to analyze what I have created and at the same time use what I have learned. I generally looked at what I have done and how I will use it in my teaching. This is the main synthesis portion of this reflection as these concepts are fused together.
Students – As I am a student in ETEC 565 it is easy for me to reflect on the use of a eportfolio. I think that an eportfolio is a great way for students to showcase their work. Students need to see what other students are doing in the class. This helps to guide students and to develop a collective knowledge. Reading and commenting on other ETEC 565 students’ weblogs also helped me to develop working relationships that may not have been established in only discussion forums. This sort of weblog is for everyone. No HTML experience is needed. By using wordpress’s WYSIWYG editor, posting and creating pages is made easy. Moreover, having students information organized on weblogs such as this makes the teachers job of checking assignments easier. I definitely see myself using this kind of weblogging to teach science 10. I think that it is important for students to have a comprehensive summary of what they have created after a course has been completed. An e-portfolio accomplishes this.
Ease of Use and Reliability – WordPress was very easy to use. As mentioned it utilizes WYSIWYG technology which negates the need for users to have HTML background. The CWL login was also beneficial. It is much easier to have one login for the whole system, but this may create security problems in some situations. In a high-school environment, it might be better to have a separate username and password for the students’ weblog. I noticed that when I viewed my weblog in IE it did not work as well as in Firefox. Some of my pages did not open and on the pages that did open there was computer gibberish. Making sure that a system such as wordpress functions in all browsers is important.
C – Cost – As WordPress is an open source software, the costs are low. The major costs that UBC would need to deal with would be support costs. As a student we are faced with a time costs. It takes a little more time to upload our material to a weblog. Usually there are some sort of format issues that need to be rectified. This tacks on additional time costs. An open software weblogging software such as wordpress is something that I will definitely consider using in the future.
T – Teaching and learning – All students in ETEC 565 were able to use the wordpress weblog. In the beginning, issues like tagging raised a bit of confusion, but this was the exception and not the norm. For those students that understand or have developed HTML skills, the wordpress site could be further customized. The e-portfolio was a good way to build upon previous knowledge.
I – Interactivity – In my e-protfolio I have included links and embedded media which will help to increase student-content, student-student, and student-teacher interactions. An RSS feed is also an option for increasing interactivity and feedback from others. By providing links and uploading media to the weblog, ETEC 565 students were able to create more engaging weblogs. This seemingly limitless environment allowed for students’ imagination to run wild. For future use with high-school students, I can see that I will have to limit what kinds of media students are allowed to place in the course so that it remains specific to the course goals.
O – Organizational Issues – The wordpress weblog was a great way to organize course assignments and reflections. Posts are all in the same area, but pages were created to help users navigate to specific areas of the course. Reflections can be hard to find as they are intermingled on the main ‘posts’ page. This kind of organization was determined by instructors. The only difficulty I had was finding the correct page to access my weblog. At times when I was logged into CWL it would not allow me a link to my weblog. Through trial and error, I bookmarked a page that will take me to the appropriate page to login so that I may access my weblog. My biggest concern would be how to integrate wordpress with a LMS like desire 2 learn so that you would need only one login id and password.
N – Novelty – This is my third e-portfolio and still the novelty has not worn off. I am still learning new tricks each time I create one of these. For high school students, I believe that since they have not created one before, they may be more interested to do so. This in turn will help them to engage with the content.
S – Speed – The e-portfolio can be created by anyone, anytime. The content that is created can be placed on the web very quickly. Simply by clicking a button your thoughts can be broadcast to millions of people worldwide. The only thing that can slow down the process is bugs in the system. For students to become not only writers, but also publishers is a strong motivating force.
Next Steps:
There are still many things that I need to learn and taking this course has taught me new things. While not everything was new, it is hard to teach a course to students of all levels at the same time. It might be good to have three courses like this that teach to different student skill levels.
I will continue to work on things such as captivate, flash, and dreamweaver over the summer. If I am really eager I may challenge setting up moodle in second life. At present, what most interests me is iClickers. I will find ways to implement what I have learned in this course. I will use Bates and Poole’s (2203) SECTIONS model to identify useful technology. I will use weblogging in my courses as well as moodle. I will utilize Alan Levine’s 50+ ways to tell a story in my digital arts class.
My new flight path:
1. Keep up to date with new technologies.
Technologies are always evolving. It takes an added effort to remain current with what is available. To do this, I will need to set aside a certain amount of time each day to read weblogs and technology papers/journals.
2. Share my knowledge with colleagues.
To gain knowledge is not enough. To enhance the overall atmosphere at work, I will need to develop a best practices section on our LMS. Here I will place what I have learned and encourage others to share their knowledge and skills.
3. Once I have reached a destination, develop a new flight path.
This is the end of the beginning. As long as humanity is intact, technology will continue to advance. New destinations will be created and others discovered.
I will continue to enjoy working with youth, technology, and science. These things interest me and as technology and science changes it seems so do our youth. As a species hopefully we can continue to evolve into something better and the best way to do this is through education. Now that we know that we can do anything, what will we do?
References:
Bates, A.W. & Poole, G. (2003). Chapter 4: a Framework for Selecting and Using Technology. In Effective Teaching with Technology in Higher Education: Foundations for Success. (pp. 77-105). San Francisco: Jossey Bass Publishers.
Chickering, A.W. and Gamson, Z.F. (1987). Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 39 (7), p. 3-7.
Categories:
Adam Rattray