Synthesis
I have said it before and I will say it again, wow, that was a lot of work.
I had a planned flight path. Although it did not unfold as expected, I still met the goals I set out for myself. My first goal was to expand my network of colleagues so that I could participate in a professional dialogue to expand my thinking and learn from others. With each course that I take, I am always amazed at the talent and skills of my colleagues. I have definitely learned from the distributed cognition aspect of this course.
My second goal was to have fun in Moodle by actively playing and discovering the affordances as an instructor. There has not been enough time and distance between this self reflection assignment and the completion of my Moodle assignment to confidently say that I have had fun. The experience was at times very frustrating and at other times incredibly rewarding. I am very proud of my work. I believe the skills that I have learned by completing the assignment are transferrable to my own work situation. My school division has chosen a new Learning Management System (LMS) using SharePoint. These acquired skills and experience in Moodle as an instructor will influence the direction of the professional development.
During this course I had a lot of unintentional learning through the eLearning toolkit experience. Some experiences were exasperating but eventually I found success. Here is a list of all the topics I explored over the last 13 weeks.
LMS
Moodle
WebCT
Web Design
iWeb
Serif Web Plus
Synchronous
iChat
Google Docs Chat
Face Time
Social Software
Facebook
Twitter
Google +
Wikis
Wikispaces
Moodle Wiki
Multimedia Authoring
iMovie
Serif Movie Plus
Garageband
Voice Memos iPad App
Audacity
Serif Photo Plus
Animoto
Phtotpeach
Mobile
iPad using mobile Safari Browser
iPhone using mobile Safari Browser
If I had a time machine, I would improve the quality and the frequency of postings about my eLearning Toolkit experiences in my blog to demonstrate my learning.
My overall experience with ETEC 565 has been positive as I have discovered a lot about myself as a learner. Some significant highlights were due to the hands on experience. My husband and kids thought I monopolized the computer before! I have spent an incredible amount of time in front of this computer during the 13 weeks of this course. However, I loved the exploration and the discoveries.
Animoto has been the greatest discovery for me. It is easy to use and I am sure that when I use it with students it will be easy for them as well. There is no longer a reason to suffer from synthesizer music in Photostory!
Another hands on highlight was the exploration of Moodle. Although challenging, I was really glad at having the opportunity to explore the nuances of Moodle. This is timely, as I have previously mentioned, since I will be implementing the professional development for a new LMS in my division.
What’s next? First I am going to go on a holiday. In fact I am going to New York City with my other forty year old girlfriends. When I get back to work, here are some things that I will be working on:
1) The planning of our professional development for the LMS rollout.
2) Opening of a dialogue of the online tools that are available and the protocol for students use.
3) The introduction of Microsoft Link to facilitate online learning and collaboration across a distance.
4) Introducing the Grade Nine student cohort to a blended learning environment as part of the Bring-Your-Own-Laptop Initiative. (This is a big one.)
As Anderson wrote in his article “Sufficient levels of deep and meaningful learning can be developed as long as one of the three forms of interaction (student-teacher; student-student; student-content) is at very high levels.” (p. 66) I can attest to the fact that ETEC 565A has achieved all three having personally experienced these forms of interaction through this course. Adapting my learning to my own work situation is necessary. I know it is more than just possible. It is probable!
References
Anderson, T. (2008). Teaching in an online learning context. In: Anderson, T. & Elloumi, F. Theory and practice of online learning. Athabasca University. Retrieved June 12, 2011 from http://www.aupress.ca/books/120146/ebook/14_Anderson_2008_Anderson-DeliveryQualitySupport.pdf