“...the process of becoming critically aware of how and why our assumptions have come to constrain the way we perceive, understand, and feel about our world; changing these structures of habitual expectation to make possible a more inclusive, discriminating, and integrating perspective; and finally, making choices or otherwise acting upon these new understandings.” (Mezirow, 1991, quoted in McGonigal, 2005, p. 1)
My attitude to computer based resources in education at the beginning of the course was affected by my previous educational background and my professional practice. I believed that the course will not introduce me to anything new that I don’t already know, but the participation in both external forums and online debate, the integration of both wikis and blog in the course, in addition to understanding the principles behind this integration and applying them in my own context, proved to me how wrong I was in my initial assumptions.
This course contained different learning activities – discussion board activities, forums and online debates, readings, and assignments.
Discussion Board Activities
Discussion activities that were integrated in this course ranged from personal recounting of past experiences “In the college where I teach, I've never taught an online course…” to constructing definitions “introducing ICT as an integral component implies a broader…”, answering questions, sharing resources, and creating lists “Please find attached my audit form…” that assist the learners in reflecting on IT skills, software, and hardware knowledge. These activities encouraged critical thinking and the construction of knowledge by collaboration.
The discussion board was active at the beginning and tended to go into sleep mode around assignment due dates, but during the course, I noticed that some of the students are adding their postings to old discussions just to fulfill the assessment criteria: I found this extremely disturbing, because I thought that participation is part of collaboration and the construction of knowledge, “collaboration allows people to do more together than they could alone” (Haythornthwaite, 2006, p.1), and that “regular contributions to online discussions are integral to the determination that a student is keeping pace with the learner-centered activities and achieving the outcomes of the course.” (Edelstein & Edwards, 2002, p.2)
Stone & Chapman (2006) stated that ‘instructor presence plays a significant role in facilitating communication in the online learning environment’ (p.1), and this is what happened in this course: the presence of the facilitator was felt throughout the discussions and played an important factor in keeping the flow going. The facilitator added some encouraging comments at times “great work and off to an early start…”, jokes at other times “We'd be happy to take the excess water off your hands :-)”, and constructive feedbacks and clarifications where needed “I've read a couple of reports with the UK offering training etc in UAE perhaps they offer something. EG http://my...”.
My attitude to computer based resources in education at the beginning of the course was affected by my previous educational background and my professional practice. I believed that the course will not introduce me to anything new that I don’t already know, but the participation in both external forums and online debate, the integration of both wikis and blog in the course, in addition to understanding the principles behind this integration and applying them in my own context, proved to me how wrong I was in my initial assumptions.
This course contained different learning activities – discussion board activities, forums and online debates, readings, and assignments.
Discussion Board Activities
Discussion activities that were integrated in this course ranged from personal recounting of past experiences “In the college where I teach, I've never taught an online course…” to constructing definitions “introducing ICT as an integral component implies a broader…”, answering questions, sharing resources, and creating lists “Please find attached my audit form…” that assist the learners in reflecting on IT skills, software, and hardware knowledge. These activities encouraged critical thinking and the construction of knowledge by collaboration.
The discussion board was active at the beginning and tended to go into sleep mode around assignment due dates, but during the course, I noticed that some of the students are adding their postings to old discussions just to fulfill the assessment criteria: I found this extremely disturbing, because I thought that participation is part of collaboration and the construction of knowledge, “collaboration allows people to do more together than they could alone” (Haythornthwaite, 2006, p.1), and that “regular contributions to online discussions are integral to the determination that a student is keeping pace with the learner-centered activities and achieving the outcomes of the course.” (Edelstein & Edwards, 2002, p.2)
Stone & Chapman (2006) stated that ‘instructor presence plays a significant role in facilitating communication in the online learning environment’ (p.1), and this is what happened in this course: the presence of the facilitator was felt throughout the discussions and played an important factor in keeping the flow going. The facilitator added some encouraging comments at times “great work and off to an early start…”, jokes at other times “We'd be happy to take the excess water off your hands :-)”, and constructive feedbacks and clarifications where needed “I've read a couple of reports with the UK offering training etc in UAE perhaps they offer something. EG http://my...”.
Participation in Forums and the Online Debate
Participating in an external forum gave me a sense of joining an online community of professional educators and assisted me in exchanging knowledge and experience. This course provided the opportunity to use different ICT tools, ad students were ‘empowered to determine what, how, and where they would like to learn, rather than forcing them into a one-size-fits-all mode’ (Tu, 2000, p. 21). The external forum was created by one of the learners.
In addition to this, the online debate was another highlight: the topic was very interesting, and during this activity, we went through the different stages of the team developing model of the psychologist Bruce Tuckman (1965) ‘forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning’. (Neill, 2004, p.1). It was left to the groups how to collaborate before and after the debate, and we decided to use a wiki where we can all add our comments, resources, and postings.
Readings
The readings were very interesting and were integrated as part of the course, but accessing them was not always easy due to the variable nature of the Internet.
Some of these readings were too technical, such as the paper of Skyrme (1997) where he defined ‘explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge’ and related it to the Internet, and other readings included detailed descriptions and uses of computer tools, such as “The collaborative aspect of Weblogs … easy peer review for students and teachers” (Richardson, 2004, p.1); but what I really liked were the readings related to the integration of computer in the classroom, where Resnick (2002) stated that “ while new digital technologies make a learning revolution possible, they certainly do not guarantee them” (p.1), Prensky (2001) came up with the definitions of ‘Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants’, and that integration cannot occur without the proper training and professional development of teachers.
Assignments
The assignments were nicely planned and advocated situated learning where “using the medium builds skills and confidence in further using the medium” (ICT HUB, 2006, p.7). Having said this, I would have liked to have access to previous student assessments where I can understand the meaning better.
At the end of this journey, I found out that now I know more about computer based resources in education but the main lesson I learnt is that all the tools don’t mean much unless they are well integrated in the learning, and that technology should not be the driving force behind learning but we should integrate it to reach our pedagogical goals.
References
Edelstein, S. & Edwards, J. (2002). If You Build It, They Will Come: Building Learning Communities Through Threaded Discussions. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, Volume V, Number I, Spring 2002. State University of West Georgia, Distance Education Center. Retrieved April 10, 2007 from http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/spring51/edelstein51.html
Haythornthwaite, C. 2006. Facilitating collaboration in online learning. Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks. Vol 10, Issue 1. Retrieved October 2, 2006 from http://www.aln.org/publications/jaln/v10n1/v10n1_2hathornthwaite.asp
ICT Hub. (2006). Collaborative working more effective ICT. Retrieved March 31, 2007 from www.icthub.org.uk/export/sites/icthub/publications/CWU_ICT_More_Effective_Use_-_final.pdf
McGonigal, K. (2005). Teaching for transformation: from learning theory to teaching strategies. Speaking of Teaching. Stanford University. Vol. 14, no.2. Retrieved October 10, 2006 from http://ctl.stanford.edu/Newsletter/transformation.pdf
Neill, J. 2004. What are the Stages of Group Development? Retrieved October 10, 2006, from http://www.wilderdom.com/group/StagesGroupDevelopment.html
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf
Resnick, M. (2002). Rethinking learning in the digital age. Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.cid.harvard.edu/cr/pdf/gitrr2002_ch03.pdf
Richardson, W. (2004). Blogging and RSS – The “What’s it?” and “How to” of powerful new web tools for educators. Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.infotoday.com/MMSchools/jan04/richardson.shtml
Skyrme, D. (1997). From information management to knowledge management: Are you prepared? Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.skyrme.com/pubs/on97full.htm
Stone, S.J., & Chapman, D.D. 2006. instructor presence in the online classroom. Retrieved August 28, 2006 from http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2/content_storage_01/0000000b/80/33/8b/6e.pdf
Tu, C.H. 2000. Strategies to increase interaction in online social learning environments. Society for Information Technology& Teacher Education International Conference, Vol 1-3, 1662-1667. Retrieved September 4, 2006, from http://eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2/content_storage_01/0000000b/80/22/7d/6c.pdf
Participating in an external forum gave me a sense of joining an online community of professional educators and assisted me in exchanging knowledge and experience. This course provided the opportunity to use different ICT tools, ad students were ‘empowered to determine what, how, and where they would like to learn, rather than forcing them into a one-size-fits-all mode’ (Tu, 2000, p. 21). The external forum was created by one of the learners.
In addition to this, the online debate was another highlight: the topic was very interesting, and during this activity, we went through the different stages of the team developing model of the psychologist Bruce Tuckman (1965) ‘forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning’. (Neill, 2004, p.1). It was left to the groups how to collaborate before and after the debate, and we decided to use a wiki where we can all add our comments, resources, and postings.
Readings
The readings were very interesting and were integrated as part of the course, but accessing them was not always easy due to the variable nature of the Internet.
Some of these readings were too technical, such as the paper of Skyrme (1997) where he defined ‘explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge’ and related it to the Internet, and other readings included detailed descriptions and uses of computer tools, such as “The collaborative aspect of Weblogs … easy peer review for students and teachers” (Richardson, 2004, p.1); but what I really liked were the readings related to the integration of computer in the classroom, where Resnick (2002) stated that “ while new digital technologies make a learning revolution possible, they certainly do not guarantee them” (p.1), Prensky (2001) came up with the definitions of ‘Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants’, and that integration cannot occur without the proper training and professional development of teachers.
Assignments
The assignments were nicely planned and advocated situated learning where “using the medium builds skills and confidence in further using the medium” (ICT HUB, 2006, p.7). Having said this, I would have liked to have access to previous student assessments where I can understand the meaning better.
At the end of this journey, I found out that now I know more about computer based resources in education but the main lesson I learnt is that all the tools don’t mean much unless they are well integrated in the learning, and that technology should not be the driving force behind learning but we should integrate it to reach our pedagogical goals.
References
Edelstein, S. & Edwards, J. (2002). If You Build It, They Will Come: Building Learning Communities Through Threaded Discussions. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, Volume V, Number I, Spring 2002. State University of West Georgia, Distance Education Center. Retrieved April 10, 2007 from http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/spring51/edelstein51.html
Haythornthwaite, C. 2006. Facilitating collaboration in online learning. Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks. Vol 10, Issue 1. Retrieved October 2, 2006 from http://www.aln.org/publications/jaln/v10n1/v10n1_2hathornthwaite.asp
ICT Hub. (2006). Collaborative working more effective ICT. Retrieved March 31, 2007 from www.icthub.org.uk/export/sites/icthub/publications/CWU_ICT_More_Effective_Use_-_final.pdf
McGonigal, K. (2005). Teaching for transformation: from learning theory to teaching strategies. Speaking of Teaching. Stanford University. Vol. 14, no.2. Retrieved October 10, 2006 from http://ctl.stanford.edu/Newsletter/transformation.pdf
Neill, J. 2004. What are the Stages of Group Development? Retrieved October 10, 2006, from http://www.wilderdom.com/group/StagesGroupDevelopment.html
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf
Resnick, M. (2002). Rethinking learning in the digital age. Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.cid.harvard.edu/cr/pdf/gitrr2002_ch03.pdf
Richardson, W. (2004). Blogging and RSS – The “What’s it?” and “How to” of powerful new web tools for educators. Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.infotoday.com/MMSchools/jan04/richardson.shtml
Skyrme, D. (1997). From information management to knowledge management: Are you prepared? Retrieved February 28, 2007, from http://www.skyrme.com/pubs/on97full.htm
Stone, S.J., & Chapman, D.D. 2006. instructor presence in the online classroom. Retrieved August 28, 2006 from http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2/content_storage_01/0000000b/80/33/8b/6e.pdf
Tu, C.H. 2000. Strategies to increase interaction in online social learning environments. Society for Information Technology& Teacher Education International Conference, Vol 1-3, 1662-1667. Retrieved September 4, 2006, from http://eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2/content_storage_01/0000000b/80/22/7d/6c.pdf
