Synthesis

Flight Path précis.

During my MET program journey, this is was my fourth stop and it was the most interesting and benefiting course.

I mentioned in my flight path that I am studying to have a role in the reconstruction in my country, and finding some ways to deliver curriculum for refugees. In this course, I have learnt several things can help me in achieving my goal. We have learnt that there are several methods to deliver content depend on the student situation, just like what we have discussed in Dafna and Trinh cases. While discussing these cases, each one of us suggested a solution that reflects his own experience and understanding of the topics. My vision is much wider now and relies more on theoretical basic.

In my flight path, I said that I want to learn about LMS and multimedia software. I didn’t think that we are going to practice them actually, but after finishing the course I am glad that for the first time I implement what I have learnt.

My eLearning tool kit experience.

I am very sorry to say that I only could access the link at the 9th week when the instructor changed the settings of the link.

I used it only in the synchronous and asynchronous communication activity and found it very useful. I like the wiki environment because usually it’s up to date and gives  several links to relative topics.

My ETEC 565 experience.

I will try to be detailed as much I can to give you a specific reflection of my wonderful experience.

When the course was opened, I was so surprised with the accuracy of the course designers. Every specific detail in the course is described clearly; the course objectives, schedule, marking strategy, required readings, assignments, lateness policy and other components. Actually, I thought about leaving the course because I found that it would be a big work load, and then I decided to go in this adventure.  I learnt from the course organizing, the basic strategies of courses’ design and how clarifying every detail makes it easier for students to keep on track and manage their time.

I found the topics ordering very reasonable and logical. Starting the course with critical sources like Bates and Poole (2003), Chickering and Ehrmann (1996) is a great motivating start. The assignments required critical thinking and problem solving skills. Setting up criteria for LMS was so interesting and required deep understanding for Bates and Poole SECTIONS.

After that, we had to set up the blog. For me, it was the first time I use blogs and start blogging, and after each assignment I felt so happy that I tried something new successfully.

Anderson (2003) inspired us with great innovative ideas about the relations between the learning components and the most I liked was the writing of Gibbs and Simpson (2004), and Jenkins (2004) about assessments and feedback. I liked it because it discussed one of the most important components of learning process which many teachers think about it in a wrong way. I found that our instructor excels assessing and giving feedbacks. Each feedback Natasha wrote to me was so specific, clarified my strong and weak points in my work, suggested better solutions and motivated me. I also liked the differences between summative and formative assessments. I agree with the idea that formative assessments have a positive impact on students more than formatives and reflect more reliable pictures of the students’ learn.  I tried to implement the strategies we have learnt during the LMS quiz and enjoyed moodle’s quiz tools

Discovering web 2 tools through the readings and applying that in the digital story assignment was exciting. The digital story assignment was my favorite one; because it required using imagination. Moreover the wiki of “50 ways to tell a story” previewed several available social media tools with a nice demo and a brief description of each tool. I took a look at most of the tools then I chose what fit my story.

The most revolutionary article was Wesch’s article “A vision of students today and what teachers must do”. While reading the article, I remembered many of my feelings when I was a student at school. His quote “Texting, web surfing and iPods are just new versions in passing notes in class, reading novels under the desk and surreptitiously listening to Walkmans. They are not the problem. They are only the new forms in which we see it”. I liked the way he suggested the solution to get students engaged.

These were some examples of my experience in ETEC 565. I didn’t want the journey to end, but hopefully I absorbed many great ideas that will assist me in achieving my goals.

The next steps..

After this rich course of information and experience I think I am coming up now with great ideas and a clear vision for achieving my goals. As I mentioned in the beginning that I want to have a leadership role in pushing forward the educational level in my country; in this course I have learnt a basic knowledge about moodle, which is a sample of the LMS and I believe that it helped me in understanding the LMS environment; however, I used moodle or other software. Also, building lessons and quizzes, creating a digital story are all useful tools in designing the learning atmosphere.  During the course I realized that old fashion technologies may be good choices for developing countries, just like what we have discussed in the diabetes discussion and they will maybe good solutions for my situation.

As a lifelong learner, I will continue opening the knowledge doors and choose what fits my case and keep in mind Bates and Poole phrase “teachers or educational administrators making decisions about educational technology should have some theoretical model or framework that guides the choice of media and technology. If not, they will be constantly driven by the latest technology development, whether or not they are appropriate.”

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