Trinh’s problems are far-reaching, but I believe that they can all be traced back to communication.

The fact the Trinh receives course communication on multiple platforms creates a logistical nightmare at best, and an incredible waste of time as well.  Trinh must organize her course so that she receives communication in one place that she will also commit to responding to within a certain time frame.  It is not fair to expect her to keep office hours, but a turn-around of 36 hours would seem reasonable.  Trinh must be diligent in her efforts to remind students to contact her using the desired channels and to respond using only that channel.

The department must also step up and give her the resources she needs to effectively manage the course.  While she does meet half of her teaching requirement, 150 students at once is too much.  In my school division, online courses are limited to 40 students per section and no more.  If the teachers’ timetable is able to be altered so that they can offer another section, then that course will be expanded and if not then it will be capped.  The department needs to set clear policy on student volume in the course so that Trinh may successfully implement her learner-centred environment.

My school division lets individual schools set their own mobile device policy.  I intend to reference our former policy (up until 2 years ago) and our current policy.

Our former policy stated that mobile devices were banned from use in the building except for lunch and spares.  Any students using a device during class time, or in the hallway during break, would have the device confiscated in the office for the remainder of the day.  This policy made mobile learning impossible.  The purpose of this rule was designed as a knee-jerk reaction to unfiltered device use beforehand.  This policy was intended to quell distractions and attempt to make the learning environment more productive.

Our current policy states that mobile device use is at the individual teacher’s discretion.  Our administration has said that as long as the device is being used for an educational purpose, it is ok to use in class.  New administration has implemented this new policy for a couple of reasons.  First, it takes the police work out of the teachers’ hands.  We no longer have to roam the halls attempting to “catch” students using their devices at inappropriate times.  As well, as we have a shortage of devices (laptops, iPads, etc.) in the school, the staff felt a need to leverage the technology already in the students’ pockets to ease the stress of over booking devices.

My course design has changed considerably due to these changes in policy.  Where I used to have stand-alone research projects in my science courses, I now have my students perform ad-hoc research.  When a topic comes up I can have my students spend five minutes Googling the topic and we can have an intelligent discussion, where under the old policy I would have to shelf the question and bring it up at a later date.

Specific rules necessary for leveraging mobile devices involve both pedagogy and logistics.  To begin with, any sites that I recommend to my students must be mobile-friendly.  This is becoming less of an issue than it was even a year ago, as most websites are designed to be both desktop and mobile: that is, the website auto-detects the browser accessing it and tailors the display to that device.  I also must make sure that my students understand what appropriate use of the device is. Gaming, texting, checking Facebook are but a few examples of inappropriate use that must be educated rather than having a blanket policy mandating against device use.

As this is my 9th MET course, I would like to think that I have a good amount of experience to draw from when working on group projects. However, there are always unexpected challenges that arise and it is up to the group as a whole to find solutions.

This project was no stranger to technical difficulties; from half an hour spent trying to get a Google Hangout to connect everybody, to connectivity issues on the due date, and not to mention trying to mesh five different schedules from multiple time zones!

Coming to a consensus first on a choice of LMS and then on a methodology of presentation prompted some great discussions. With all of us coming from different contexts with different requirements (personal, district, and legislative) made me seriously consider our choice of LMS in more depth than I would have in a group with similar requirements.

However, the members of my group did a phenomenal job overcoming these challenges. As with all challenges; patience, understanding and a willingness to help wherever needed made this a positive experience.

Benoit must be careful in making his selection of a LMS, as “online LMS have the potential to affect the core business of teaching and learning in unanticipated ways.” (Coates, James, & Baldwin, 2005)  He must first have a framework of hisonline course; considering whether to offer the course asynchronously or synchronously, how to  go about embedding both formative and summative assessments, and logistical considerations such as registering users, managing activities, etc.

Benoit must also consider the level of student engagement afforded by his choice of LMS.  A system that has limited forms of student interaction will be less robust than one featuring discussion boards, interactive chats, and other engagement tools.

If I was in Benoit’s shoes, the most important question that I would ask myself is: How can I best meet the needs of my learners?  This question is crucial because without meeting the learners’ needs, the course cannot be successful.  Benoit must spend significant time researching the features of each LMS to determine what matches his comfort level in terms of pedagogy and assessment techniques.  A LMS that does not align with his professional practices will result in significant time spent learning the system and changing his practice to match the limitations of the system.  As Coates, James, and Baldwin found, the choice of LMS will have consequences that may change the teacher’s behaviours (p. 27)  Benoit will still have to spend time marking and giving feedback on his students’ work, as the course is a writing course.

The fact that WebCT is officially supported by the university lends itself to be the natural choice, but with support limited to official channels, speed of access to these supports appears to be an issue.  Having Moodle operated by the Faculty lends itself to more informal tech supports.  A simple walk down the hall to a colleague could resolve an issue in minutes.  However, new issues that arise could be problematic if they have not been experienced by others in the past.  Even so, there is a vast wealth of knowledge online regarding both LMS, so Benoit should have a reasonable ability to resolve his issues with a little legwork.

I expect that Benoit would take approximately 4 weeks to come to a detailed and educated decision about his LMS choice.  A minimum of one week would be required to fully examine each system, testing previously developed courses on each system and reflecting on how well each system aligns with his professional practice.  I would expect Benoit to spend at least a week to reflect on each system and one final week to test out new thoughts and new ideas generated from his reflections.

Personally, if I were in Benoit’s shoes I would choose Moodle.  The local level of expertise in the faculty coupled with the massive amount of online, informal support seems like the better option to me.