Final Reflection for Distance Learning Class

Week 8 Reflection


My eyes were opened in this course when I discovered that the definition of distance learning included more than just the plethora of online courses! I had been involved in this type of learning across the years as I took video courses and correspondence courses, so I guess I should have anticipated that it would be a natural progression for me to move to an online learning environment. After all, the reasons that those early distance learning courses worked for me are the same reasons that the online courses work for me now. As a busy adult working full time and raising a family, I have never been comfortable in a traditional learning environment, as it has never met my needs. I see the natural progression, the natural evolution, of the online course as a means to an end, but I think that a lack of understanding of the nature of the beast is keeping it from widespread acceptance still.

I left one school district where there was a blanket policy not to accept any online courses for professional development. I knew I would never be able to further my education under those circumstances. Thus, I moved to my current position, knowing that I would have to prove the validity of the online program that I wanted to pursue, but at least they would consider it. My current district has developed a policy that they will accept distance-learning classes if they are from accredited programs and if they are recorded at the 600-course level or above. I think this is a realistic policy, and I know that in being allowed to study this way, I have been able to show the district administrators what the courses look like and the rigor and relevancy of the coursework. I think that there is still a resistance to online learning because of a lack of familiarity with it. However, as nearly all major colleges and universities are offering part of their curriculum online, the idea of online courses is going to become mainstream. What becomes acceptable at the higher levels of education will then trickle down to the secondary level and even lower levels. This is the way it has worked with prior changes.

Even over the course of being enrolled in two programs through Walden, I have seen changes in the acceptance, albeit at the secondary level it has been more of a “If you can’t beat them, join them” approach rather than embracing online learning. However, everything in education takes a long time to change! Just look at the fact that the school year is based on an agrarian calendar when we are no longer that type of society! I think the changes in mindset are going to be client-driven, rather than institution driven. As the cost of education keeps going up, and the economy still is stagnant, the old model of going away to a four-year college is going to have to change. The influx of students into community colleges in this country already demonstrates this is happening! However, students will need to have their educational needs met beyond the two-year offerings in a fiscally responsible manner. Online education will be a viable alternative in many cases. Therefore, I think we are at the very verge of an explosion of the common acceptance of this type of learning. I think as more and more well-known universities make online offerings known, it will continue to gain acceptance. Twenty years from now we’ll have moved on to some other form of distance learning, and we’ll wonder why anyone ever resisted this type of learning.
I think my role in promoting distance education is to keep addressing how it may be used in my current setting and explaining what it is not! I am currently on my district’s “Future Trends in Technology” committee, and I have already been able to bring to the forefront the idea that we have what we need to offer and control our own online credit recovery program. From my coursework, I have been able to discuss these ideas with our technology people, administrators, and fellow teachers in an educated manner backing up my ideas with solid pedagogy. I find my biggest role is dispelling, or at least addressing, concerns about what online courses can and can’t do. The biggest concern, outside of cheating, has been the fact that students do not have the social interaction that they would in a classroom. I have been able to explain that just the opposite may be true when a course is designed correctly and participation is required, especially as compared to the shy student who sits in the back of the classroom and never volunteers an answer in the traditional classroom! I think, to be honest, that the way I am going to be able to help promote distance learning in our district will come down to the idea of writing and piloting a course to show that it can work. I definitely see this on the horizon, and with the help of this class, I feel that I will be prepared to design curriculum that will meet the needs of the district, the instructors, and the students.

Converting from face-to-face to distance learning

WARNING - I'm writing this through a haze of painkillers after enduring 9 surgical procedures on Friday. The good news is that I'm upright; the bad news is that despite wearing my glasses, the text keeps going "in and out." The bottom line is please forgive any errors in this!

I decided to take the approach that good teaching is good teaching no matter its format, and that therefore the key idea to converting to any distance learning environment is starting with a solid lesson plan. That's no different than in a traditional class, though. I then broke up the brochure into categories. The inside of the brochure points out the philosophy of distance learning and explains what differences to expect in a sidebar. The back of the brochure lists tips for instructional designers and facilitators to help ensure a positive learning experience for the students. I did try to use a little humor on the cover suggesting that there is no need for a melt down when facing this change! I tried to pick out the highlights upon which to focus, and I felt that the video this week really did a good job in addressing many of these specific issues related to this task.

A "brand name" doesn't always guarantee high quality!

I feel like the child who just discovered there is no real Santa Claus, rather only the spirit of Santa Claus! This feeling is a result of my exploration of an open course offered by THE Yale University. THE Yale University whose name echoed through my head as a high school student as my father hoped to send me to an Ivy League school. When this assignment was given to explore one of the free online courses available through them, I thought it would be the key to unlocking the mystique of what made Yale and all those other iconic institutions almost magical! Wow! If it turned out to be something special, I planned to explore their English offerings further after this course. I could almost see my father in heaven smiling, as I finally would attend the school he always dreamed of for me. Well, Dad, I hate to disappoint you again, but just as I told you when I dropped out of the big name university to attend Northern Illinois University, the name doesn’t promise quality in all areas, and this online course was an example of that!

I chose to explore a class that would be particularly relevant to my current teaching position: The American Novel since 1945 (http://oyc.yale.edu/english/american-novel-since-1945/content/downloads.html ). Upon first examination of the home page, I found the open courses available at Yale to meet my basic expectations. The philosophy and objectives were clearly laid out at the main text on the page and the departments offering courses were links on the left. Upon clicking on English, once again the department philosophy and objectives were listed at the top of the page, and I saw four offerings, each explained succinctly along and featuring a small picture of the professor. The navigation at this point was easy, and the general objectives of the course were clear.

However, as soon as I went to the page for the specific course, I knew I was in trouble. This course doesn’t meet any of the criteria that have been established in our readings or media presentations as to how a course should be set up! This is definitely NOT a distance education course. It is simply a filmed version of the face-to-face class! In addition, the filming was done in the actual classroom, and while the sound is excellent, the pacing of the teacher back and forth across the dirty chalkboard and the movement of the students were in the audience but caught in the filming frame drove me to distraction! Where were the activities? Where was the chance to explore ideas on my own? How could I relate to my fellow learners? Where was the technology? There was really no excuse for some of these things because this course was filmed in 2008. The technology and knowledge to create this course to be truly effective was available at that time!

There was no evidence that the ADDIE process was followed at all. There is little commendable that I can say about this course other than they do make the technology available in a multitude of ways, such as multiple audio and video file formats, so they did take into consideration what technology needs the learners might possess. However, that is the extent to which they addressed the needs of the distance learner. Even when I did go to download the files for the course, which were difficult to locate due to the multiple formats within the file folders, it took so long to download 250 mb at speed of 1.5 mb/second using my DSL line that I did exactly what Dr. George Piskurich warned about could happen in this week’s video; I multi-tasked as it was downloading and lost interest. In addition since I could have simply downloaded the lecture as an mp3, I could have skipped the video part altogether.

I can’t tell you how disappointed I am in this offering, which I’m sure is not much different than the other courses they are offering as Open Courses. Knowing that it’s Yale, I can’t believe that they totally ignored everything that makes an online course effective. As a matter of fact, I would like to compare this to an online course for which one pays to see the similarities and differences. I think instead that this was purely done as a public relations tool: “You, too, can attend Yale! See what our classes are like!” This is supported in the fact that there is very little financial expenditures associated with creating these types of classes. Someone just has to turn on the switch on the video camera and use a template for the courses and fill them in and make the links. I think of the suggestions in this week’s second video about how time consuming it is to create the framework for the course, to analyze which technology to use, and all of the other steps, including the alpha and beta testing and resulting tweaking, and I can only believe that none of that was done. Unfortunately, this public relations tool could ultimately backfire on Yale because the material is presented in such a boring manner to students who must be passive learners, other than writing papers in isolation, that I would think this type of course would discourage, rather than encourage, learners.

So, once again, I’m back to my idea that I first proposed to my parents back in 1978 when I decided to leave the prestigious university I was at to come back and attend my state university because there really wasn’t much difference between the two, other than the price tag. Therefore, just because the course has the name “Yale” associated with it doesn’t guarantee quality. I think instead a better adage to consider when looking at this class would be, “You get what you pay for.”

Week 3 Application: Suggestions for using learning technologies

Example 2: Interactive Tours

A high school history teacher, located on the West Coast of the United States, wants to showcase to her students new exhibits being held at two prominent New York City museums. The teacher wants her students to take a "tour" of the museums and be able to interact with the museum curators, as well as see the artwork on display. Afterward, the teacher would like to choose two pieces of artwork from each exhibit and have the students participate in a group critique of the individual work of art. As a novice of distance learning and distance learning technologies, the teacher turned to the school district’s instructional designer for assistance. In the role of the instructional designer, what distance learning technologies would you suggest the teacher use to provide the best learning experience for her students?


1) The first thing I would do is check and see if the museum web site offers virtual tours that would allow students to view the exhibits on their own either before or after the discussion with the museum curators. This way they can spend as much time as needed going back and looking at the artwork to absorb what the curators explained, while the teacher does not have to “reinvent the wheel.”

2) Next, I believe, since the instructor is new to distance learning tools, I would try to keep the approach simple and focus on something the instructor and/or the students already know how to use. Therefore, I would suggest the use of two-way audio/video conferencing for a virtual fieldtrip, in this case, through Skype. Through Skype it would be very easy, for example, to connect multiple museum curators in different exhibits at one time with the class . All it would require is having each curator logged on to his/her own lap top with an eyeball camera who walks students through the exhibit, showing the pieces, adding comments, and answering live questions from the students as they went. This portability is exactly one of the benefits of this type of technology (Simonson, Smaldino, Albright, & Zvacek, 2009)! The teacher could connect her one computer to an LCD projector so the entire class could participate at one time. The curators would see the students, and the students would see the curator. As our text points out, the use of this kind of application that focuses on “live, synchronous” distance education is growing rapidly (Simonson, Smaldino, Albright, & Zvacek, 2009).

3) My second suggestion to the instructor then would be to set students up with gmail accounts so they may access Google Docs. I would then have the teacher post to Google Docs a Word document containing the images of the artwork she wants students to discuss, and I would have her share that document with the groups of students she establishes. They may post their comments in the Google Doc the instructor shared in a conversation format, all working simultaneously, avoiding the problems that wikis have in that only one person can have open and comment on the wiki page at a time. On the other hand, students could also use the chat feature in Google Docs to share their ideas before posting their final conclusions to the Google Doc. The instructor could look in on any group to see how progress is coming, to offer insights, to check chats, and to facilitate the discussion, as needed.

4) Both of these options would address some of the barriers facing schools. There is no extra money needed to utilize the technology for this experience, assuming that a classroom has at least one computer with a camera built into it and an LCD projector. There would be no accessibility problems since the material is not stored on a school server. All students would be able to access and write in the Google Doc from any computer with Internet access, no matter what word processing program might be used on the computer. Compatibility issues disappear. In addition, the instructor needs minimal training to be able to use Skype and Google Docs and may even already have had personal experience with those tools. On the other side, students would be able to have pleasant personal interaction with the museum curators. The ability to have a conversation and get immediate feedback to their questions would enhance the learning experience and remove the passivity factor (Simonson, Smaldino, Albright, & Zvacek, 2009) that would occur if students merely watched a video about the exhibits. The use of Google Docs would allow participation by all group members, even those who tend to be quiet. It would give students a “sense of community” (Simonson, Smaldino, Albright, & Zvacek, 2009). All of these factors should add up to an easy, effective learning opportunity.

References

Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., & Zvacek, S. (2009). Teaching and learning at a distance: Foundations of distance education (4th ed.) Boston, MA: Pearson.

Mind map re:Distance Learning

Re-defining distance learning: Week 1 blog

9/11/10 Redefining distance learning - Week 1 blog entry

• Your personal definition and observations of distance learning before starting this course. Consider what you learned about distance learning this week and how this learning has influenced your personal definition.
  
  
• Before starting this course, I thought of distance learning simply as what I have been doing with Walden and that which I researched prior to starting a master’s program, taking online courses. Therefore, I thought of distance as a rather recent development or at least since computer technology has become available to the masses in terms of cost and accessibility. I had never classified all of the other categories of learning outside of the traditional classroom as “distance learning.”
  
  

• Speaking metaphorically, I also thought of it as the “Cinderella” of the education family – a hidden beauty full of potential but often looked at in a condescending way by those in power. I have developed this attitude due to the response I’ve received from school administrators with whom I’m have to fight to continue my education. Due to my husband’s job as an athletic director that requires him to keep erratic hours that vary widely in any given season and from week to week, I am the parent responsible for all of our children’s activities and supervision during the school year. As a result, I cannot commit to being in a classroom in a specific location even just one night a week. I do find it ironic that my reason for turning to online courses is a reflection of the reason for the popularity of Anna Eliot Ticknor’s Society to Encourage Studies at Home back in 1898 (Laureate Education, Inc., 2010). So, more than one hundred years later, all of these cohort learning opportunities, including those brought into our schools by our administrators, have never worked for my circumstances. The only opportunity I have had to continue my professional growth is through online courses that offer asynchronous learning. Yet, I have met resistance every time I have approached an administrator about my desire to continue my education through online courses. This style of learning has not earned the reputation for quality that traditional classes provide. However, in comparing what I’m doing in my classes, online, as compared to my peers sitting in a cohort, I’ve had better quality teachers and more relevant instructions and projects than they have. What is it going to take until administrators catch up with the times and recognize the value of this type of education?
  
  

• Your revised definition, which combines your previous thoughts about distance learning with new information you learned this week.
  
  
• What a shock I had when looking at this week’s time line and noting how far back distance education actually goes (1833) and what it includes (Laureate Education, Inc., 2010)! Of course, it includes correspondence schools and transmission of lessons by television and radio (Laureate Education, Inc., 2010); however, I had never heard the term “distance learning” applied to these mediums; therefore, I never considered them as such. My own students make up credits through correspondence classes where material is sent back and forth through the mail, but even that appellation has been shortened to just the name of the school, rather than the method of delivering and receiving learning materials. No one gives a second thought to learning across a distance when done through the mail.
  
  

• I also had never considered the wide variety of technologies involved with distance learning prior to this week - from the telegraph to the television and from satellite to the Internet – nor the institutions (Laureate Education, Inc., 2010) involved in laying the foundation for the level of acceptance and quality available today (another reason to love Duke other than its basketball team!). Who would have thought Wisconsin, Iowa, and Pennsylvania would be early leaders? Yet, it is exactly the characteristics unique to those states that would require innovative responses to the learning needs of their inhabitants.
  
  

• All in all, I would say that my definition of distance learning is much more inclusive and broader now than it was at the beginning of the week. As a result of learning what it has incorporated in the past, I have a wider vision of what the future may bring.
  
  

• A summary of your vision for the future of distance learning as it continues on a path of evolution and change.
  
  
• It is difficult for me to predict the technological innovations that will occur that will impact distance learning because technology is expanding exponentially. If I were to make an educated guess, however, I would think that the changes in technology will continue to evolve to allow even more interactivity with simpler and simpler interfaces to encourage non-technologically oriented learners to be successful.
  
  

• As far as the impact in secondary education, where my concerns focus, we are just now in the process of recognizing and formalizing the 21^st Century Literacies that students are going to need to succeed (NCTE, 2008). This must become pervasive at the post-secondary school level before it trickles down to the secondary level where I teach. Until colleges demand these skills from their students, I do not think that the majority of secondary schools will respond quickly. This may happen sooner than I expect though if it is true, as stated in the article “The Evolution of Distance Education:Implications for Instructional Design on the Potential of the Web,” that economic and access issues are driving an explosion of growth in this area (Moller, Foshay, & Huett, 2008).
  
  

• In addition, perhaps politics will play a role in moving this kind use of technology down to the secondary level. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, speaking on July 15, 2010 at the College Board AP Conference, said that we must stop thinking of high school graduation as an “end point” and instead, consider it a “launching pad for further growth and lifelong learning for students.” He went on to call the current structure of schools outdated and not serving its student populations in meeting the needs of today’s world (Duncan, 2010). If valid school reform would truly move to the forefront of the political agenda, distance education could become an invaluable tool hooking up students with opportunities that might not otherwise exist.
  
  
  

References

Duncan, Arne. (2010, July 15). [Address]. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's Remarks at the College Board AP Conference on The Three Myths of High School Reform. [Transcript]. Retrieved September 11, 2010, from http://www.ed.gov/news/speeches/three-myths-high-school-reform-secretary-arne-duncans-remarks-college-board-ap-confere

Laureate Education, Inc. (2010). Distance learning timeline continuum [Graph]. Retrieved September 7, 2010 from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=4442084&Survey=1&47=3976079&ClientNodeID=984650&coursenav=1&bhcp=1

Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Huett, J. (2008). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the web (Part 2: Higher education). TechTrends, 52(4), 66–70

NCTE. (2008). NCTE positions statement: The NCTE definition of 21st Century literacies. National Council of Teachers of English, Retrieved from http://www.ncte.org/positions/statements/21stcentdefinition

Back to blogging! This time it will be for a course in Distance Education, a favorite topic of mine! My goal is to move my high school to providing its own credit recovery program based on our own curriculum and delivering it online. I've got a long way to go to convince the power that be that this is a viable alternative!

My mind "over runneth" with learning theories!

• Now that you have a deeper understanding of the different learning theories and learning styles, how has your view on how you learn changed?
• Over the length of this class, I have developed a much broader understanding of learning theories, including simply the number of theories that exist! I was very naive in labeling myself simply as a visual learner! I think my greatest "aha!" moment came when we explored the nature of adult learners, and I recognized myself in the description of this particular group of learners and how I have been this independent, self-motivated learner who wants my learning to be relevant and immediately applicable. I also agree with the NCREL description of adult learners that stated that says, "Transfer of learning for adults is not automatic and must be facilitated" (n.a.). I've really struggled with all of this new information in this particular class. I realized that I've been doing all of these things as a teacher, and as a learner, but labeling and separating them has been a challenge!
  
  
• What have you learned about the various learning theories and learning styles over the past weeks that can further explain your own personal learning preferences?
• As I mentioned above, my greatest revelation came from an understanding of what it means to be an adult learner. As such, it explained why I did not enjoy my university experience when I was younger, which was geared for the traditional student, while I was an atypical student who was married and lived off campus and held down a full-time job. The learning and projects weren't relevant to me, and there was no collaboration on projects, which would have been difficult for me because I didn't live on campus anyway. I am basically a social person, though, so I enjoy sharing ideas, but I still prefer the option 0f completing assignments on my own. Again, this is just a matter of practicality as I must squeeze in my assignments as my hectic schedule allows, which, again, is typical of adult learners. I want to know why I have to learn something; I need to see its immediate application and relevancy to my life (Conlan, Grabowski, & Smith, 2003). Tied in to this, I see that the theory of connectivism also applies to my learning style. I need to see how ideas are related to one another. I don't learn them well in isolation. I've noticed that this preference also shows up in my teaching then, as I consistently try to explain to students, before they even ask, why we are learning things, and how the ideas connect. Therefore, I teach grammar in context of literature and writing. I am glad that curriculum has changed over the years to reflect this thinking. I remember teaching 16 weeks of grammar to freshman years ago that was torture for both them and me!
  
  
• What role does technology play in your learning (i.e., as a way to search for information, to record information, to create, etc.)?
• Personally, I cannot separate technology from learning! I use technology for everything I do related to learning. Of course, as a teacher, my life revolves around learning, either on the part of students or myself as I prepare for their learning. Therefore, I not only do the research for learning using the computer, but much of the work I assign for my students and that I do for my own classes involve the use of technology such as digital photography, wikis, the use of our class website for resources I've found or created, email, online grade books, online databases, and suitable software applications like Word, Excel, Inspiration, PowerPoint, iWeb, iPhotos, iTunes, and QuickTime. My technology has become such a vital part of my life, especially my computer, that when I do no have access to it, I feel lost!
  

References
Conlan, J., Grabowski, S., & Smith, K.. (2003). Adult Learning. In M. Orey (Ed.), Emerging
perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved , from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/

North Central Regional Education Labratory, Initials. (n.a.). Adult learning theory. Retrieved from http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/methods/technlgy/te10lk12.htm

Connectivism

• How has your network changed the way you learn?
One thing that I've noticed is that I now prefer to communicate via online tools than by phone. I'm not comfortable on a phone, so I would just not communicate. However, words come easily to me, and with the convenience of blogs, email, discussion boards, etc., I find myself much more involved in communicating with a broader range of people, more regularly, than I ever did before.


• Which digital tools best facilitate learning for you?
I'm comfortable with so many different ones that I find that I don't have one particular favorite, but rather I'm not afraid to use a variety of tools to suit my purpose. I will say that switching to my iPhone has probably been the greatest technological challenge I've faced recently, as I had huge issues trying to get my fingers to work on the touchscreen. It became a personal challenge, but not before I went back to the store to think about returning it! I can't imagine going anywhere without it now, and I love the fact that it gives me access to so many things I use all the time -- Facebook, text messaging, email, Internet. For example, when I went to the wrong school for my daughter's basketball game this week, I didn't panic! I simply pulled out my iPhone, searched the school website for where the game was really taking place, and then clicked on the mapping feature to find a route to the school. It was a great stress reducer! I think that's how I view these digital tools. They are just that -- tools -- which make my life easier and more complete.


• How do you gain new knowledge when you have questions?
How I gain new knowledge depends on the type of knowledge I am seeking. If it's something related to school, I will usually turn to those with more experience in my school setting and talk to them face to face. However, if it's something I need to use, such as when developing a new unit, I turn to the wide variety of teaching resources on the Internet. If it's a personal question, I send out an email or a text message to whomever I need to reach since getting to a phone is nearly impossible during the day. Mostly, though, I like the freedom to search for information that I find relevant by reviewing a variety of sources and reading the reviews of others who have used the information previously.


• In what ways does your personal learning network support or refute the central tenets of connectivism? I use the best tools to suit my needs, yet how I learned to use those tools isn't isolated to one setting. For example, I learned to use blogs in this class, but now I'm using them to help my daughter raise funds to study in Costa Rica this summer. My learning in one area carried over to another. Similarly, I have used my network of friends initially gained through face to face interaction to share Malia's fundraising efforts through Facebook and email. Everything I do is inter-related. The skills I have, the people I associate with, are not isolated to one part of that web. Those I teach with are on Facebook; those I taught are on Facebook. I keep up with family more through email and Facebook than through the phone. They know about my life from multiple perspectives through their own interaction with these tools. I go to church, but those same friends text me to share meeting times and post them on Facebook.
  
  The bottom line is that it was very hard for me to develop this map because it called for separating out the different components in my learning network, and I found that there's so much overlap between them that this map is somewhat forced in that it shows more separation and clarity between the segments than actually exist.
  

Reflecting on learning theory articles

Week 2 Entry for EDUC 6115

Article #1
de Freitas, S., Rebolledo-Mendez, G., Liarokapis, F., Magoulas, G., & Poulovassilis, A. (2010). Learning as immersive experiences: Using the four-dimensional framework for designing and evaluating immersive learning experiences in a virtual world. British Journal of Educational Technology, 41(1), 69-85. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2009.01024.x.

This article intrigues me as it discusses the types of learning that can be done by setting up virtual world and using role playing. I have only used a virtual world in showing students specific things, like the 3-D model of Shakespear's Globe Theater. WE haven't worked within that world as a learning environment. This article suggests that learning takes place within the context of the social interactions that occur within the virtual world, as well as within the context of the experiential learning itself. I hadn't thought about that before. Interestingly, it also stresses the fact that activities can be structured to be used within this virtual world to encourage learning to take place. This type of activity promotes lifelong learning, of which I'm a huge proponent. I like to be able to answer the "Why are we learning this?" questions. What we teach needs to be relevant beyond our classrooms. I also like the idea that some structure can be provided because with my limited exposure to virtual worlds mostly through video gaming and such, I thought learning was purely coincidental. So, I'm just wondering how I can set up a virtual world to capture the themes of Catcher in the Rye in order to update it making it even more relevant to today's teens. I certainly agree with the statement in the abstract that reads, "The challenges that remain . . . rest with the design and delivery of these activities and experiences" (deFreitas, et al. 2010). This makes me think......

Cutrim Schmid, E. (2008). Potential pedagogical benefits and drawbacks of multimedia use in the English language classroom equipped with interactive whiteboard technology. Computers & Education, 51(4), 1553-1568. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2008.02.005.

The second article I looked at pertains specifically to the subject area I teach in, English, in terms of the impact of using an interactive whiteboard for multimedia purposes and how this ties into cognitive learning theory. This articles points out both the pros and cons of the use of this application, which is encouraging since I have only been encouraged by my school to use the whiteboard in such a way because the money was spent on it. Learning beyond the basics has been low on my priority list because I haven't had an idea of its potential. In reading the article, it points out, among the list of positives, that the multimedia capability allows students with different learning styles to perceive the information in ways not otherwise possible. Thus, for some, it can make abstract concepts more concrete (Schmid 2008). Similarly, the ability to imbed other resources, such as video clips, within the multimedia presentations, seemed to encourage learners to make connections more easily without being distracted with the movement from one resource to the next and created more channels for learning the concepts(Schmid 2008). A major drawback that was mentioned is that the amount of information that can be presented to students using the whiteboard in this fashion can be overwhelming. It allows for much faster movement between pieces of information (Schmid 2008). I think this would be a valuable idea to keep in mind, especially if using this format to teach English to English Language Learners. Time needs to be built in to absorbing the material.

Both articles point out the need for careful thought and planning when designing curriculum that uses these technologies. They are there, and they can be good, but they need to be used wisely.

Setting up this blog for EDUC 6115

Well, I get more practice with blogging! We just set up one for my daughter who is fundraising to go to Costa Rica this summer, so now Mom gets to follow suit! I'm interested in learning more about this! Lori