Changing Roles and Pedagogy

Progress so far

I can't believe that part one of the course is over. I am still on the journey. Doing the activities in the first half of the course enabled me to build confidence in my role as both online teacher and student. While I was familiar with the various roles of an online teacher, I was able to delve more into them to determine personal adjustments that need to be made to effictively teach online. I did get a little better at facilitating asynchronous online discussion more effectively as a student and as an instructor. Certainly resources such as "Socratic Questioning" were helpful.

The Wimba experience and using the tutorial and actually participating in the synchronous session made me more comfortable with the technology needed for its use. I am anxiously anticipating my co-facilitation with another student. I hope it goes well and that we provide the interaction that is needed for the session.

I do like the HTML quizes. I still need to work on them. There is always one question that absolutely stumps me.

I find that there is subtlety in my learning experiences. I may not think I have learned as evidenced by my grades, but what I have learned in these two courses in the ONTL certificate program creeps into my own teaching, and I am actualizing what I have learned.

Essay on Expectations

Introduction

I am planning to focus on learning how to improve my use of technology. Another goal is to enhance my skills in providing interactive activities and resources to form online learning communities.

Improving Use of Technology

While I am comfortable with some types of technology, I am unsure of my skills in others. I find learning new technology threatening. Because of my fears, I tend to do things too speedily. I guess this is to "get the learning assignment over with". I hope to get comfortable with being an online facilitator, which is a new experience for me, especially using the live tools. Although I am uncomfortable in executing tech tools, I find that once I learn them and incorporate them into my assigned online classes, they work out well. This certainly increases my confidence in facilitating online classes. For example, for some reason, I find it difficult to communicate live urls-especially for my blog. Something in the url is always missing. This happens even when I copy and paste from the site. This has taught me the importance of always checking my urls for resources used in class to make sure they are "live" for student access.

Forming Online Communities

During the last class, I was introduced to the term "online learning communities". This was a new experience for me. It didn't really dawn on me that forming these communities is an important part of providing interactive learning, until the course was almost over. The experience of communicating using WIKIs and/or Google Docs demonstrated a different way of communicating for one who is not involved, and does not intend to be involved with social net working. I must admit that our group worked well and so did the technology.

An important part of forming communities is selecting interactive activities and the technology to deliver them. I began to explore various resources in the last class. I was especially interested in videos that would enhance student learning. While I did have some problems with Youtube videos, I learned a lot and have incorporated them into my current web-enhanced class. I want to learn more about how to find appropriate learning resources for my students-and myself.

I see my experience with online learning classes as a journey. There will be some bumps in the road. I have confidence that my group and other support people will help me continue on.

Welcome Back

Hi:
Well it's a new trimester and a new course. Hi to all my friends to be taking ONTL651. It should be an adventure!