Course Description
Learning Technologies: Selection, Design and Application
ETEC 565A is an online seminar that provides several theoretical frameworks to assist educators in evaluating, selecting and using various learning technologies. Students will gain hands-on experience using a range of learning technologies and platforms: web-publication, course management systems, communication tools, community and collaboration tools, multimedia, and social software tools. Students will complete a number of small assignments using different learning technologies as well as a larger project in which they bring several of these technologies together to design materials and activities to support student learning.
Reflection
This course was by definitely one of my favourite courses in the MET program. I took near the end of my journey (my 8th class) so I had been comfortable with both Vista as well as the MET program’s expectations. I feel if I took this course early in my journey, it would might have been more difficult as it really ventures past the Vista LMS and into many other exciting areas of program delivery. In this course, I was introduced to WordPress and created my very first UBC Blog. I also learned 50+ Ways to Tell a Story a valuable resource that I’ve shared with many colleagues across a variety of departments and is use extensively at my school. But the most significant learning piece was creating a Moodle Website for Graduation Transitions 12 at MPSD; a project that I am still undertaking and will be presenting to the MPSD School Board’s Education Panel in 2012. Our professor challenged us to use test the limitations of the Moodle site and required us to go beyond the basics in terms design. For my site, I used HTML and JavaScript to created a site that did not have the traditional look and feel of a typical Moodle site. According to MIT (Panettieri 2007), LMS system enhancements are organized into six categories:
- Content Management (class materials)
- Website Structure
- Homework (assignments and submissions)
- Access control
- Interaction with students (e-mail and RSS feeds)
- Ease-of-use enhancements
I tried to incorporate these factors when creating my GT12 Moodle site. Of all of the great projects I have completed during my MET journey, this is the project that I am most proud of and that most tangible for me as a teacher.
Panettieri, J. (2007). Addition by subtraction. University Business, August, 58-62. Accessed online 11 March 2009. http://www.universitybusiness.com/viewarticle.aspx?articleid=845
Artefacts:
I have chosen two artefacts from this class. My first MET Blog for ETEC 565A that was instrumental in using WordPress as my platform. By using and understanding WordPress, I have also switched my teaching philosophy students are constructing websites; I have from Web 1.0 (Dreamweaver, FrontPage) to Web 2.0 (Blogger, WordPress). The second was my LMS site for Graduation Transitions 12 that I’m still working on and hoping to complete in 2012.
Graduation Transitions 12 Moodle Site for ETEC 565A