End of chapter 1...

Last week. For the first time I am going to post a picture, following my colleague Amjad. It represents how I feel at this point. I have already walked a lot towards my objectives, but there is still a lot ahead of me.


As I reflect about the last weeks, there are some considerations I must do. I’ll put them in a list, as Andreja uses to do.

1) I loved having this reflective blog! Although it was the last task I completed, it normally was the most pleasant, and I really want to keep this habit. I am going to keep this blog and resurrect another I created for another course;

2) I need to develop my “distance-learning skills” a lot! I am still very used to face-to-face discussions. But I have one characteristic when writing – I tend to be very objective. I haven’t come to a conclusion if it is a good or bad characteristic for online courses;

3) I have managed to implement some small changes in my teachers’ group. I taught them how to create a blog (they are not blogging very often yet, but this is the next step), I created a site for the English group, for sharing documents and links, following our wiki sample, I have been able to share many of the interesting sites I have seen throughout this course – teachers seem to be very motivated about these novelties;

4) I rediscovered many things, I was a bit rusty in some aspects. The ABCD format for pedagogical objectives is similar to what I was used to see, but easier to apply. The development of lesson plans and projects – I mean, the task of thinking about all the steps, and writing it down – helped me to organize my ideas. I am quite an active person, and normally tend to do more than one thing at a time. Being forced to put everything on the paper (plans, ideas, reflections, comments) seemed a waste of time at first, but helped me a lot. It is funny that only now, exactly at this moment, I realize this.

5) As I did not have students to test my project, my task was double, since I had to think about all the “what ifs” as Deborah and Sandra said. Again, a new personal skill was developed. Planning is hard, deciding a plan B, and sometimes the plan C, is even much more difficult.

Concluding. When I applied for this course, I had two main objectives. First was to add more knowledge about the use of web and technology resources in teaching and learning, which is a subject that enchants me. My second objective was to understand how an online course must be prepared, organized, developed. I had had another experience before, but let’s say it was not so intense. I used it as a comparison pattern. My intention is to become able to design online workshops and courses in the future. But what I got from this experience is much, much more than I planned. And it was great. I am sure I could have done even more, and I hope I have the opportunity of doing so.

Thanks Sandra! Thanks Deborah! Thanks to all my colleagues! This is not an end, this is the “commencement” of the second chapter. I hope you stop by sometime, leaving comments, suggestions, or at least a “hi”.

See you soon

Marcia

Leia o post completo...

Not fiction, reality...

One more week and it is over. I cannot deny I am feeling a kind of relief. I feel as if now I will be able to explore all the things that have been "passing in front of my eyes"... It is like a film we watch and like a lot, but then we have to watch it againg to listen to the dialogues with more attention, sing the theme song along, find out the details of the climax scene...

I have completed my project and it seems more real to me now. Even though I have not tested it in real, I can say that I have thought about itso much, the possible results and the necessary changes and adaptations, that I feel as if I had tested it in classroom, more than once. And added to this, the best product of this week was that I created a wiki page for my teachers' group, for sharing ideas and materials. It has already started well, with additions by other teachers. I was expecting this to happen only next week, since I had not introduced it formally to them, I had only sent the online invitation. I am delighted with the infinite possibilities that are about to become real.

Finally, I have to congratulate our tutors for the project peer correction task! It was amazing. All the elements were so integrated (the checlist and the rubric) that our task was more like a complement of our own project. I "corrected" (if I can say so) Roland's project, but I was in fact evaluating mine. This was a great experience, that I intend to put into practice in my courses and classes. The objectiveness of the rubric also deserves my applause. Besides this, this task made us feel closer to our fellows, it created a friendship atmosphere.

Thanks to Roland for his help with my project. I am sure there is still a lot to add, but it is the first step. I am sure it is much more a real project now.

Marcia

Leia o post completo...

... aiming for the stars...

As I was not able to post in my blog last week, I decided to add some reflections to this week’s posting. There were some things that seemed very interesting for me about last week readings, and I cannot avoid making reference to them.


First of all, I just loved the text Teaching Naked: Why Removing Technology from Your Classroom Will Improve Student Learning (http://ctl.stanford.edu/Tomprof/postings/786.html). It may sound controversial to have an e-course on webskills and say that I am fan of a text which title says to remove internet from the classroom. At first that sounded weird to me too. But after reading the text, I saw that the point the author want to state is that the good management of our class time includes using only what is necessary in class, leaving things that can be done by the students individually, as a preparation or complement of the lesson, like using the net, for example. That leads to our topic this week, which is autonomy. I am also very fan of it, keep telling my colleagues, we must teach our students how to learn, then they will learn by themselves. If we do not give them the tools they need, we cannot ask results from them. For example, if our students have never been taught how to search words in the dictionary and find the best definition or synonym for a word, how can we give them an exercise that requires this and expect them to do it?

I wrote in my application for this course that I “strongly believe that the key to work with many students in class is to motivate and teach them to work alone, so that they become independent, and responsible for their learning”. We have to want them to become active, keeping in mind that this does not make us totally passive, but in a different acting position.

Now, I would like to address here a comment Sandra Jeffs did when commenting on a colleague’s posting this week: “We must have good classroom management, motivate students, teach our curriculum, and notice all the subtlies happening with and between our students, etc. Teachers are blamed for a great deal of perceived deficiencies in education. So, are we teachers "super people?"If we think we are "super people" are we setting ourself up for problems when things don't go "perfectly?"

Well, I don’t think we are super people. What I have seen in my teaching life is that we want this label when things are great, but we deny it totally when things don’t work well. And I totally agree with Sandra, since she herself gave an extraordinary answer, saying that “we teachers need to keep our feet on the ground, while at the same time aim for the stars”.

I am surely aiming for the stars, as well as this group and all the other unique teachers I was lucky enough to meet in my life.

Special regards for Roland, for sharing his project with me and for his great words about mine. Thanks!

Marcia

Leia o post completo...