Project Documentation Introduction Model

Assignment Reflection

Here is the link for my Moodle course on Space for Grade 6.

This assignment took some time as I looked to target a unit in science in which I was familiar with but needed to make adjustments so that it would adhere to the learning outcomes of the new BC curriculum. It was advantageous for me to create content and activities related to a subject I teach so I would be connected to the course and have an end product I would want to be able to test out and use in the next year. I initially spent time sifting through the new components of the curriculum in order to develop an appropriate unit outline. I wanted a unit outline that I could incorporate into a blended model to help deepen the understanding and experiences of my students. As this avenue would be the most appropriate way to conduct most of the content in the classroom and allow for activities and assignments to be carried out online at school or at home. However in the end for this assignment relative to ETEC 565A, my result is a complete online unit adhering to the new Grade 6 curriculum in Science with a target audience of student’s aged 11 – 12 year olds.

 

Along with preparing the outline, I also spent some more time practicing using Eliademy once completing our first assignment and compared that with the Moodle environment. I elected to go with Moodle as I preferred its design and use specifically for educational purposes. I definitely encountered some frustrating moments, as I didn’t have experience with either of the platforms until this course and it took time to iron out my roadblocks. I learned a lot from different YouTube videos when I was unsure of how to accomplish imputing a certain element or correcting a task. Looking over the other examples made available to us helped me to ensure I included all pertinent elements. Some of the features I added were a Google form and images I created using Piktochart. Both of these features I used in other courses and the familiarity of how to use these components made it easy to incorporate into my course pages.

 

I elected to use a Google form to synthesize some information I would like to know about my students to better understand my class’s needs and to further develop my student’s prior knowledge. I have been using Google forms extensively this past year and have become quite experienced at transferring the information gleaned to excel to use with different types of graphs or applications. Gathering prior knowledge is useful to me in order to know how to focus my class and to know what facets need to be reinforced. The initial form given out in the introductory module for my students would suffice to provide formative feedback to me to influence how I would support the teaching in my course and the learning of my students (Bates, 2014). In addition, Lin, Lin, and Huang have documented that building up what a student already knows acts as an important foundation prior to commencing the unit of study (2011). By having my students fill out a survey through Google form I can find a baseline for what the students are already familiar with and areas where more explicit instruction will be necessary so that I can develop and expand on their knowledge prior to proceeding with the first module.

I used a quick questionnaire on Moodle to ask content which included some personal information such as their e-mail address because I didn’t want to ask personal information through a Google Form since that content is kept cloud based and outside of provincial jurisdiction in BC and with the age of these students under 13 my thoughts were to keep their personal information separate as they are not old enough to self-consent through Google.

The backward design model helped me to design my course outline and the subsequent activities and lessons I plan forthcoming. I have used this design when creating lessons or unit plans for my students so it was key in my development of this introductory module and looking ahead to assignment 3. I selected learning outcomes that were specific to BC’s science curriculum for grade 6 to help me develop some focus questions for the inquiry project at the end of the term.

Communication Methods

I elected to offer a few ways of communication with my students. The first way to communicate through this course was for my students to use the Weekly Announcements forum under the welcome page to see reminders, upcoming tasks, general feedback and advice. The other forum for general questions allows for student communication with the entire class and the teacher. The Communication forum for General Questions is for students to ask questions to their classmates as they may be able to answer their question or it is I place where I will answer the questions and hopefully my answer will address a concern for more than one student. The third way of communication I will offer is a direct e-mail between the teacher and student so that the students can notify me to discuss any pertinent concerns, illnesses or emergencies that are private. I also wanted to allow parents to sign in for the course so they could monitor weekly announcements and read over the criteria for assignments in order to better support their child with their learning. As students in this grade made my unfamiliar with asynchronous learning and response time I let them know the expectations of the response time (24 hours during the week and 48 hours on weekends). I also wanted to instil the use of the students developing an online community of learning with their peers and allow time for their peers to respond to their question.

In regards to students communicating with each other, I wanted to have an introductory module that introduced my students to the concept of an online learning community and how to best go about becoming an active participant in class. As Garrison et al, (1999) points out the importance of students forming an online presence in their class. As grade 6 students this may be their first time taking a fully online class so these parameters would need to be reviewed. I wanted to encourage students to read the Weekly Announcements the different types of communication available in order to learn how to help each other. I would assume the students enrolled in this course would all be within the BC provincial region and therefore our time zones would be relative similar so I could also make myself available for a face-face conversation through Skype or Google chat. I plan to offer this means of communication to students who do poorly after the module tests to try and address any concerns. In addition once my students have their projects proposals developed I would like them to present them to real time me so that I can further help guide their research and investigation. I also have decided to have the student’s comment on each other’s projects proposals prior to their due date in the last activity as Gibbs and Simpson identified the importance of immediate feedback in the learning process, even if imperfect serves a strong purpose to help refine a student’s ideas (2005).

Assessment Strategies

For this Moodle course I will offer a few different assessments. The first assessment is for the students to highlight their knowledge of the selected vocabulary terms for this unit prior to proceeding onto the next assessment. This will act as formative assessment and help influence my focus of supporting my students. Other forms of assessment will include an assessment on their participation in all discussions forums, quizzes and tests for each module, and a final project in which I will have students chose a topic to investigate an inquiry that includes topics under the umbrella of components of the solar system.

Students will have access to the rubrics used to assess for participation in the discussion forums and the final inquiry project. Some of the components in the rubrics designed I have used in my own teaching practice in a face-to-face teaching environment so I am curious how they will translate into a fully online course. I decided to end this course with a final project as it makes the learning personal for the student as they have some choice in the topic. My most recent teaching experience at my current school highlights that the form of assessment I would be giving them mostly drove my students. Gibbs and Simpson have also found “what influences students most was not the teaching but the assessment” (2005). Therefore it is important for the rubrics to be made available for my students.

Conclusion

There has been a learning curve with understanding Moodle and I definitely am more empathic towards course designers and instructors and the realm of options they have available to work that are required to support and meet the learning needs of all of their students. It has been a challenge but I am satisfied with my first components and I look forward to including the detailed sections of assignments 3.

 

References

Bates, T. (2014). Teaching in digital age, Chapter 8. Retrieved from http://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/

Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (1999). Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2-3), 87-105. Retrieved from http://www.anitacrawley.net/Articles/GarrisonAndersonArcher2000.pdf

Gibbs, G., & Simpson, C. (2005). Conditions under which assessment supports students’ learning. Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, 1(1), 3-31. Retrieved from: http://www.open.ac.uk/fast/pdfs/Gibbs%20and%20Simpson%202004-05.pdf

Lin, Y., Lin, Y., & Huang, Y. (2011). Development of a diagnostic system using a testing-based approach for strengthening student prior knowledge. Computers & Education, 57(2), 1557-1570. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2011.03.004