Month: October 2010

Working my way through the Picasa E-learning toolkit activity was a lot of fun because it allowed me to get reacquainted with one of my favourite pieces of software. In addition, it reminded me of how powerful and useful the Picasa software is. The first step I had to do before I could work through this activity was to install Picasa. Recently, my main computer had died (the screen went black). This forced me to purchase another computer. Since my laptop is so new, I had yet to install some of the software that I usually cannot live without. One of these programs happens to be Picasa. It is quite unbelievable that such a great piece of photo editing software is available for free to download. It definitely is a testament to Google and their ability to create creative, powerful, and fun software. Using Picasa in conjunction with Gimp (another free photo editing software similar to Photoshop) gives me all the photo editing and organizing that I need.

Once I had installed Picasa I decided to browse through the more recent pictures on my computer to see if I could find something I could use for the tutorial. After a few moments, I decided to go with a picture I took off of the pier in Sechelt, British Columbia. I chose this photo because of beautiful scenery captured in the photo and because it was one of the first photos I had taken with my brand new iPhone 4. The iPhone 4 camera is a treat to use and it has rekindled my love for photography, mainly because it takes excellent photos and because it is convenient.

Editing my photo was a breeze in Picasa. Cropping the photo was the first edit I made and it really could not have been easier. Once the photo was loaded, there were many editing function icons to the left of the photo. Under the tab “Basic Fixes” is where you can find the crop functionality. Once you click on this function, you take the crop tool, place it on your photo, and drag the cursor over the area of the photo that you would like to preserve for your new cropped photo. The new cropped area will become the darker area of the photo. If you like what you have selected, the next step is to press the apply button and you are set. It really doesn’t get any easier than this, which is one of the reasons why I endorse Picasa so extensively.

Resizing a photo in Picasa is just as easy. Once the user has a photo selected, all they have to do is click on file, which is located on the menu bar at the top of the screen. Next, find the export picture to folder button. Once done, you can enter the resize t

I also decided to experiment with some of the other editing features of Picasa using a different photo I recently took. To make the picture more appealing I cropped the photo. I then added an effect called “B & L focal point” which removed most of the colour of the photo aside from a little bit around the middle. The end result was very pleasing and took very little effort on my part. That is why I feel that Picasa is great for blogs and webpages as you can manipulate pictures easily using Picasa’s simple photo editing features. To summarize, I really can’t say that much surprised me or challenged me about using Picasa, but I will say that I am always blown away by the software’s ease of use and extensive features list.

Oh and did I tell you that it is free?

I really enjoyed reading the Anderson article for this week as it revealed some poignant information. Having little experience myself with online learning, it was interesting to get Anderson’s take on the matter. As well, I think that the article has provided me with some good insight in how I might structure my own online learning environment in the future to provide for a better online learning experience.

Like I had previously stated, my experience with online learning has been limited to only the courses that I have taken within the MET program. Looking back at these courses, I am confident that each and every one of them followed what Bransford, Brown, and Cocking believe provides an effective learning environment which they call the “attributes of learning” (learner centred, knowledge centred, assessment centred and community centred).  The one area that perhaps some of these courses could improve is with assessment. While Anderson argues that an online learning environment provides ample opportunity for assessment, within the MET program there have times when I desperately needed more assessment from the instructor. In one course the assessment didn’t come until I was given my final grade. This was obviously a situation which was rather stressful as throughout my MET journey, I have sometimes doubted my abilities to be successful.  I feel that if a learning environment such as an online or mixed mode course is to be successful, that all the attributes of learning need to be in place. This includes an online environment where students feel comfortable and competent. As Anderson states, “…the effective online teacher is constantly probing for learner comfort and competence with the intervening technology, and providing safe environments for learners to increase their sense of Internet efficacy” (Anderson, pg. 4).  I will say, however, that collaboration amongst my peers has always been high in all of the online courses I have taken which has fostered peer assessment. Perhaps this is the constructivist way?

How I might use the learning technology tools to help create meaningful interactions is through the use of video blogs. I have always had an immense interest in using video in an educational environment. With my grade 7 class a few years ago, I began experimenting with having the students create video blogs about themselves to share with the rest of the students. The students would follow the criteria to create a video blog, and then they would proceed to respond to other students’ video blogs. I feel that this type of meaningful interaction provides the students with a collaborative activity that assists them with knowledge construction. Perhaps in the future, I will use video blogging for a social studies or science unit to help students share in ideas.

Last week I decided to take a stab at working with Moodle for the first time in my life. Although I would like to say that the experience was mainly positive, a feeling of frustration in working with Moodle would be a more accurate description. In the next few paragraphs I will comment on my experience with using Moodle and describe some of the challenges and surprises that I encountered along the way.

My initial impression with working with Moodle was a feeling of confusion, awkwardness and lacking inspiration. Although a little harsh, I do have my reasons for these observations. For example, as I went through the activity I found adding content to the Moodle site to be somewhat confusing as I was constantly searching for buttons and menus, at times guessing in order to complete the task. I can contribute some of this to my inexperience with using Moodle, which is to be expected with learning any new piece of software. However, after an hour of using the LMS, I didn’t feel any more comfortable than when I first started. This is seriously disconcerting to me for two reasons: One being that if an experienced computer user is having difficulty, how would someone with little experience be able to create an online course using Moodle?  Secondly, I am concerned that I will struggle to create my own course with Moodle.

In addition, I also found the graphical user interface (GUI) to be rather bland and completely void of any inspiration. The GUI really didn’t speak to me or provide the inspiration that some software GUI’s do. Maybe that is not the intention of the GUI but I am one of those people that are greatly affected by the GUI of software. For example, one of the reasons why I enjoy using Cubase audio software so much is because of the way it looks and feels. In my opinion, a graphical user interface can greatly affect the way you interact with the software, even affecting content that you create. Hopefully I will be able to get around the “look” of the software and focus more on learning the functions and features.

Even though I found fault with Moodle, there were some positives that I can take away from the experience. Firstly, I thought that Moodle was fairly fast and responsive. For example, I didn’t experience any lag when I added text. Secondly, Moodle, from what I could tell, seemed to have a lot of features and options to create a successful online learning environment.

I believe that my biggest challenge that I face with using Moodle is the appeal of the interface and finding my way around. Having to create our own course using Moodle will be a great challenge but, nevertheless, I look forward to learning the system and creating an excellent Moodle site.