My Flight Path(Vision, statement of purpose for ETEC 565A)
Hello, My name is Mike Tunnah and I am currently an instructor at Vancouver Community College in the School of Hospitality Management. I teach fulltime and also work in the hotel industry part time. I enjoy working with students at this level for many reasons. The primary reason I enjoy my job so much is that I help facilitate student interest in a wonderful industry.
I possess a BBA from Acadia University. I have recently completed my Provincial Instructors Diploma, an adult education specific diploma from Vancouver Community College. This diploma provided me with the fundamentals of how adults learn and how to teach them. I am currently enrolled at UBC in the MEd in Higher Education. This particular Masters program studies higher education institutions structure, governance, finance and other aspects. It has been a fantastic learning experience and has answered many questions I had regarding the operation of my own institution. This is the second MET course I have enrolled in and I enjoyed the first very much. Upon completion of my Masters I plan on completing a certificate program in online instruction through VCC.
My primary goal for ETEC 565A is to master MOODLE.
Objective #1
Become intimately knowledgeable about MOODLE and it’s many functions. Build a course shell and show competency in all aspects of MOODLE. Primarily I would like to learn how to build and use assessment tools, discussion boards, and embed links and media.
Objective #2
Establish and learn how to create exceptional communication within an online environment. I want to learn what an online instructor can do to facilitate constant, meaningful dialogue between students. Especially between new adult learners who may not be highly self motivated.
Objective #3
I would like to learn how social media can best be used in my own context. Frankly Web 2.0 scares me. Especially when you read reports such as E-Learning and Beyond: A discussion paper prepared as part of the campus 2020 process for the BC Ministry of Advanced Education. Sinclair, McClaren, Griffin(2006) claim that learners will play a cooperative role in their education. They describe this role as a collaborative approach between student and teacher. Allowing students to shape their learning experience as much as they are shaped by it. This next clip is kind of what I am talking about. I will be teaching this group very soon and I need to understand how to best connect with them.
http://www.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEFKfXiCbLw
.com/watch?v=aEFKfXiCbLw
Objective #4
How can I creatively incorporate media into my courses. Currently I use websites, videos and audio, yet I feel I use them in a simple way. I would like to find different uses for them or even try and have students create the media as a learning tool. Check out the following video to see a clip of just how far media and instructional technology has come.
I require:
Time and lots of it. Curriculum development funding from my college would also be nice……VCC is quite supportive and has MOODLE experts available to assist with my learning of this open system LMS. I am also fortunate to have mentors and an organizational structure within my own department that supports me and my goals.