Monday, March 17, 2008
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St Patrick's day; to be sure... to be sure!
This week is about mid semester for both clusters of the Diploma of e-learning and I am interested in finding out where people are at. I will be sending out an email online survey for all students to complete to get a picture of progress and issues, so that this feedback can be incorprated into the new multimedia delivery. So this weeks mantras are .. to be sure... to be sure...? (how to reflect with valid feedback ) and of course happy St Patricks day.
You might want to link to this classic
http://songza.com/z/rsar1d
So what are you sure of right now?
- What are you learning that is new or revised (content, knowledge)
- What are you learning in terms of (processes, methods, communication)
- What are you learning ( about how you learn, what you like, what you don't and how are you dealing with this?)
Here are my reflections around my learning and these questions.
I am learning more about conducting human resource needs investigations and the differences between quantitative and qualitiative research. Words for the week are: cognitive anthropology, educational connosisseurship, heuristic enquiry, phenomenology and critical ethnography. Mmm. Thanks to one of my group of education cluster students I was given a great example of a way to use a wiki as content for a topic in this e-learning program. Check this link out and see how creative and clever this group has been about co-creating content and a knowledge development process as a collaborative exercise..
2. I am learning more about the value of communication and how it can be enhanced in the online environment if access to a virtual classroom was more efficient and effective. Big fan of being able to get elluminate but TAFE Qld not there yet!!! My study processes need work. I am a writer as well as a reader and taking notes is not very time efficent. Keeping a large piece of butchers paper to track assessement development might be an enhanced writing process for the current university assessment. I am giving it a try
3. I am enjoying two dofferent approaches to learning in my current university study. One is where all of the readings, notes, answers to questions and a precriptive study plan with options is supplied and everything is laid out for the semester, text, notes, assessments etc. The other is using more tchnology via a blackboard format and trying to meld the expereinces of the face to face and external student with chat rool links to tutorial sessions, transcripts of sessions etc. Interestng to observe this mix of learning strategies and to consider my enjoyment around these models. plus ...
a timely perspective from a TAFE student and dealing with our TAFE speak.. and documentation.
I was reminded of this by a friend who recently enrolled in a couple of short course building accreditation processes at a TAFE College. His intial experiences in enrolling were very positive and we both commented on this as a positive process. Then in the mail he received so much paperwork that if he had read it all he would never have finished the short course in the time allowed. All of this information he was given I am sure related to the current AQTF audit requirements and what TAFE Q;d has decided a student must be given as per these guidelines. The question is when is enough enough and how does the student sort through all of this information to get what it is relevant and necessary to begin. How do you even begin to deal with this information if your literacy skills are not so great and you are a distance student!
The example above was a timely reminder to me as a TAFE teacher to step back from the on line induction process of the past and think clearly about what needs to be completed and how this should be staged from an induction perspective for this new multimedia group. I am just about to commence a new group of multimedia students in the Diploma of e-learning and am sure that in the initial stages of this program there is information overload. I guess my philosophy and practise is to err on the side of too much information rather than not enough. A staged approach is really the key but based on the VET emphasis and preponderance of audit fear that permeates part of TAFE Qld Institutes and management compliance mentality in VET being able to structure this induction as a learner focused strategy becomes quite difficult or does it. This will be my challenge.
Plus how do you get valid feedback from current participants to enhance new delivery what are the key questions? Is it luck?
What have I come across over the last weeks in terms of technology and tools. I have discovered that my snagit trial has had its day and I miss this tool, I did come across another series of tools that are tagged in my delicious site. I am still trying to get VET virtual to work effectively and had four sessions last week with varying success. It still is an improvement on the janison chat room even if we only use the chat section. Many students express their frustration with the janison chat room so it is importnat that I pursue and explore other options, it just takes time....
Visual design/website design
I am needing to set up a new instruction to a webhosting site for the new mm group as netfirms the free hosting site that we have used in the past is no longer free. So far I have found only one that might be useful that is bravenet.com. So if you know of others I would love to hear of them. I am currently struggling with storyboarding an online unit to become a template. I am so into the value of the internet as a resource repository for content these days that i do not see a lot of need for content on pages. However I am trying to balcnnce this with the one click approach and the filtering information role that instructional designers should be focused on in this information age. Plus picking the eyes out of text books and modles of deisgn is vrery time consuming. I will post the example to this blog in the next weeks and would love to see some feedback. Check out this link to the 50 coolest websites as determined by this group.
Instructional design
I am currently unpacking some of the competency units in the TAA diploma and working collaboratively with a couple of TAFE Qld colleagues at other Institutes to develop some online resources for the delivery of the Diploma of TAA. Doing this collaboratively and trying to design the template, one day a week is challenging? It seems like I just get my head around the process and I have to stop and realign my focus back onto the other part of my job. I should be good at this bitsa but am struggling right now and wanting to meet deadlines so that we can work efficiently as a design team. Currently considering the questions for the mid semester survey for students. I cam across 7 principles of good practice in distance education that i might use as a basis for this weeks survey. Check out this link if you are interested.
E-Learning methodologies
I have been interested in the persectives of the education cluster students as they design the learning experiences for the group as a collaborative team. many of them were worried about this process however most have expressed the value of this type of activity and so it is pleasing to see this has been a worthwhile learning activity for some. It is a bit like this
when trying to meet all learnrrs needs with activities? Virtual Communities
The education cluster learners are commenting favourably on the value of the being a community and I am trying to see that this happens with the new multimedia students. This is in a state of flux and about to be reenergised for the current multimedia students as they jump into their assessment task 6 group assessment. It is interesting to step back from this and watch the learning styles and skills of students in this collaborative task.
The faciltator/The organisation
So my organisation is now starting the process of implementing the new Learning management system my.tafe and resource bank and it is therefore timley to consider the strategic imperatives of where e-learning is heading in this Institute and how this is planned and managed at both a strategic and operational level. I am interested to have a chat with my manager about this and see how I can gain support and technical assistance around some new ideas I have... the bottom line is that there is minimal staff and OI need to understand the institute priorities to be able to write an effective business case. It is interesting to consider why an e-learning program should be supported... do face to face classes get supported? What is seen as a target for e-learning etc. This type of information is what the education cluster students investigate in some of their education cluster assessments. It might be timely to do this here at TNQIT I will add it to the to do list.
A photo from a couple of years ago staying with the weeks Irish theme..... me at Michael Collins grave
and I didn't even mention potatoes and Guinness!!
Currently Reading: Atonement
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