Category Archives: CS2: Aspen Group

Lenora should create the website. The dial-up connection shouldn’t be an issue, people made websites back when everyone was on dial up. The issue with that being that she will have to find a way to work around that limitation. There are different ways she could go around making a site. She could use an online drag-and-drop program, which would be the easiest. If she chooses this method then she will not have to worry about buying a domain or sorting out working with an FTP client (this would simplify things tremendously) however, in her situation, this may not be the best choice as those sort of interfaces would require a faster internet connection. She could check herself out some website coding books from the library and write the page by hand to upload, which would be perfect on a slower connection. Unfortunately, this would represent a large time commitment, which seems like poor choice for Lenora. Therefore I feel that the best choice would be to buy or download a software program that would do the coding for her, like Google Web Designer. Depending on her hardware, she could bring her device to the school to download the program.

This type of web design program would allow her to work to design a site with minimal knowledge of coding and she wouldn’t have to use the internet until she uploaded to her server. Programs like these are usually fairly user friendly and she should be able to work through problems she might have.

When designing though, she really needs to think about what her goals are from the beginning. Cradleboard seems to be a one way transmission of knowledge, very simply constructed. Since this resource helped her, is this style something she wants to mimic? Or does she want something that is more two dimensional/ co-constructed? She says she wants to allow

offers of “support and suggestions from other Aboriginal educators and their allies in addressing the particulars of bullying behaviour in band schools”. I feel like the best way to do this would be to give the information she learned from her PD in static pages with categories, and also form some sort of discussion board where teachers can post about bullying issues at their schools and have a network of peer support to help them to come up with solutions.

In the end, I think that a website is the best way for Lenora to go as it offers all of the functionality that she will need and has the potential to be built off-line or through dial-up. I think that initially there will be a significant amount of time required of Lenora to figure out how to create her website through trial and error. There are many helpful resources online and she will be able to tap into her passion for the project when things get tough. Hopefully though, by planning for her end goals from the start, she will design a website that is user maintained and will significantly reduce her workload in the future. Perhaps as one last piece of advice, Lenora should do the bulk of the work over her summer holiday!

Hi Everyone;

Sorry for the late post.

First of all, I have to say that Lenora impresses me. Despite her lack of experience with technology, she is passionate enough about creating culturally-relevant anti-bullying resources for her colleagues that she is willing to consider creating a website from scratch. However, as you have all discussed already, this may not be the best route for Lenora, considering that she is new to the process and has limited bandwidth at home.

The idea of using Cradleboard as a starting point makes the most sense to me. This established learning community would be an excellent springboard for a discussion about bullying in the classroom, especially as there are probably a lot more people interested in this topic than Lenora is yet aware of.

My suggestion would be to create a social media site on Facebook where Aboriginal educators from all over North America could come together to share resources and discuss relevant issues. Ideally, Cradleboard would allow her to have a widget on their site where she could post her Facebook (FB) link and invite members to join. (A simple email request to the site’s creator could get it started.) Lenora is a very busy person and although she is committed to this process, she needs a platform that runs itself.

The other reason that I like the idea of using Facebook, is because of the importance of communication around this topic within the community. Lenora herself is aware of the importance of reflective practice and a FB community would facilitate this. Bullying is a day-to-day issue in the classroom and it would be great if educators could share their challenges and suggestions with some immediacy.

As many of you have already suggested, once Lenora is ready to post learning resources, it may be wise for her to create a wiki. It could start out as a simple text-based site, but as Lenora improves her digital-literacy skills, she could upgrade the learning assets.  It would then serve as a place that she could reference on the FB page and direct people to the resources that she, and perhaps others have created. I imagine that in time, her wiki could really take off. However, I don’t think that it would ever preclude taking advantage of the immediacy and convenience of FB’s social medial platform.

Hope everyone had a nice weekend.

Kind regards,

Tanya

Reference

Porto, S. (2015). The uncertain future of Learning Management Systems. The Evolllution: Illuminating the Lifelong Learning Movement. Retrieved from http://evolllution.com/opinions/uncertain-future-learning-management-systems/

Lenora’s limited experience with developing a website, and her limited online access at home, are two important considerations for determining an option that might best meet her needs and goals. One potential solution for Lenora would be to create a wiki, as this would allow for the sharing of documents and information, as well as offering collaborative opportunities for her colleagues to discuss problems, ideas and resources. According to the Bates SECTIONS framework (2014), the first step in selecting technology is to know your students (or in this case, Lenora’s colleagues), their similarities and differences, what technologies they already have access to, and what digital skills they already possess or lack. Therefore, if Lenora is experiencing difficulties with online access and technical expertise, it seems likely that many of the colleagues with whom she intends to collaborate will be experiencing the same challenges. Lenora will need to bear this in mind when she is selecting and developing her online anti-bullying resources. As her colleagues seemed to have enjoyed utilizing the cradleboard.org resources, perhaps Lenora could get some feedback from them regarding some of the aspects of this website that were positive and beneficial, and other areas that needed to be changed or addressed. This would give her a starting point in determining what her own resource might look like in order to best support and meet the goals of her anti-bullying project.

Creating a wiki requires minimal technical expertise, and the user friendly interface would allow for flexibility in creating the organization and visual layout of the website. These templates would be adaptable to Lenora’s needs as they may change in the near future, and she would be able to design her wiki during the initial stages with opportunities for personalizing the content and design as she becomes more comfortable and clearer with her intentions. According to Coates (2005), an important aspect for consideration is the ability of a given technology to be adaptable to the needs of diverse academic cultures and communities. Google Sites and Wikispaces are two options for creating a wiki that Lenora may wish to explore, as they would provide the flexibility and adaptability needed to address the diverse and changing needs of her community of professionals. Both options offer Lenora a basic starting point from which she can develop her knowledge and level of comfort with designing and maintaining a wiki, and both options offer a user friendly interface from which to work with.

As far as privacy and access are concerned, a wiki would allow Lenora to control and manage the accessibility of the information and discussions contained within. She could decide to share access only amongst colleagues or have the wiki available online publicly, and she would be able to determine the level of permissions for each individual person that has access to the website. Regarding the content of the wiki, different documents, presentations, photos and videos could be incorporated into and shared within the website. Many of these items could be created offline when Lenora is working at home, and she would be able to integrate and upload this content into the wiki when she has better online access, such as during her time at school. This should help support her in maintaining the balance between work and personal time that she is seeking.

References

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

Coates, H., James, R., & Baldwin, G. (2005). A critical examination of the effects of learning management systems on university teaching and learning. Tertiary Education and Management, 11,(1), 19-36. http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11233-004-3567-9

I do not feel that creating a website is the way to go for Lenora. In keeping with Bates SECTIONS model, the students needs must be considered. If the material is not culturally relevant to the community it is suppose to service then the content will not help the teachers who in turn will not be helping the students. Secondly, the ease of use of creating the website seems to be barrier for Lenora since she has limited skills in creating a website from scratch. An alternative solution is for link onto the existing Cradleboard resource to create a discussion forum where teachers can share their personal stories and she can reply to them based on the information that she learned from attending the professional development workshop. The discussion can then help to modify the material such that it is more relevant for the community to use. This alternative may be less time consuming and takes advantage of the infrastructure of an existing web resource. If the existing Cradleboard website has been useful to the First Nations community from an access point of view then it makes sense to build upon that resource so that the information is centralized.

Bates, T. (2014). Chapter 8: Choosing and using media in education: the SECTIONS model, Teaching in digital age. (p. 257 – 291). Retrieved from http://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/