Learning Technologies: Design & Applications

Communicating Online

One of them most practical things I learned in the MET program is how to discuss online.

At first, I was writing dissertations and I didn’t know how to use the HTML, so my comments were big blocks of words!

At one point, in one of the courses, we touched on:

• the importance of changing the label of your discussion (easier to retrieve)
• the necessity of being brief, clear and informative
• the delicate nature of communicating with written words only… hence the positive use of emoticons (they help make people feel more at ease) 🙂
• KISS (Keep it simple and … “something”!!) – just learned this one recently.

It is sometimes a challenge to feel “connected”… but when I think of our community of practice, I see professionals who are interested in learning and developing their competence.

RE: Chat on Moodle

I am basically new at Moodle… so for some of you this may not be interesting! ¡Ay caramba!

• I explore the chat activity and added one to my UBC Spanish Moodle site.
• I wrote an introduction.

You must choose a news that interest you and that comes from Latin America or Spain. Explain what happened… and give your opinion. You must chat for at least 5 minutes and talk to more that one person.

• This is linked with a part of the course in which news about the Hispanic world are presented by students (via the web) every day. This chat would happen at the end of the term, let’s say, when everyone has presented a news.
• My rationale:
  • Our language program is focused on communication and culture
  • By chatting, students are empowered to present their personal interest and it has been proven that some students, who tend to be more quiet in the classroom, communicate more via this type of tools.

RE: Synchronous or not?

To tell the truth, this whole online learning experience has been possible for me due to the asynchronous learning / communication. As a professional, without this aspect of the MET program, I would not have been able to participate.

One of the drawbacks listed in our course material is that “students may not feel as connected”… In my experience, we feel as connected as we connect ourselves. It is very similar to f2f. Some students are there (physically & the rest), while some are only there physically :-)… I exaggerate to make a point.

On the other hand, some of the experiences I had using chats were really fun! A bit chaotic, but a riot! That’s where I learned the meaning of LOL (really!!!).

I do miss the voice option, as a multimedia teacher, but it is really complicated to organize times to meet… so I guess this is a serious limitation to the use of these tools.

I have enjoyed making and watching videos of people presenting their work, ideas. When we produce this kind of document, there is a lot of thought that goes into it. Editing insures that the films are tight and informative.

Module 3: Interaction and Assessment Tools / Communications Tools

RE: Synchronous and asynchronous communication