The Upside Down ~~

It all started with a simple idea to help students who are absent to catch-up with the lesson and it gain fame after people find it effective in improving students’ performance and also discipline problems in schools.

The role of the teacher as the sage on the stage is regarded as traditional. What is in trend now is teachers as the facilitator, guiding on the side and students will do the job. The teacher will prepare the teaching materials e.g. videos for the students to watch at home before the lesson. They can communicate with their peers and teachers via online discussion regarding the video watched. When they come to the classroom, with the help of the instructor, concept engagement will happen when further discussion and questioning session takes place in small groups. To flip the classroom, teacher need to identify the educational technology tools to be used and activities to be carried out to create a conducive learning environment for effective learning process.

This whole idea is exciting but the main concern is do I have the time to prepare the videos and the learning activities cater for a flipped classroom and what will be the students, parents and school administrator's reaction on this idea? I do hope when the time has come for me to execute this method, I will receive full support from all parties... =) For the betterment of teaching and learning process. 

The New Toy =)

I was thrilled when Dee introduced “Schoology” in her presentation. Schoology is a Learning Management System (LMS) and a social network for sharing academic content. It looks like something similar to the most popular Facebook minus the distraction. Feel like starting up one soon…

I enjoyed Dee’s presentation on Teaching and Learning with Internet: Pedagogical strategies, Activities, Web Resources 2.0. She started with the definition on pedagogy (a conscious act designed to enhance learning), strategy (the ways to be carried out in order to achieve or reach the goal) and pedagogical strategy (the instructional designs applied in the teaching and learning). Some popular pedagogical strategies are behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism and social constructivism and now we have an emerging theory which is connecticism (Siemens & Downes, 2006). “There is no single pedagogy that provides absolute success for all students”. Therefore, teachers ought to be equipped with a sound knowledge of the pedagogical strategies in order to be able to choose the suitable strategy to be apply in a particular lesson to achieve the intended learning outcome.

To ensure effective E-Learning, there are 7 principles of good practices given by Gamson:

1. Encouraging contacts
   
2. Develop cooperation
   
3. Use active learning techniques
   
4. Prompt feedback
   
5. Emphasize time
   
6. Communicates high expectations
   
7. Respect diverse talents/ ways of learning

Starting and sustaining an E-learning environment will require extra effort than having lessons in school only. When it comes to the Internet (which is full of fun and excitement and distraction), we need to have something in our site that will attract the students to constantly visiting and the teacher’s availability is also very important as students will expect to receive comments and response ‘immediately’. All these will require the teacher to constantly check on the T&L site. Besides, the task given should be able to cater to the ability of all students to reduce frustration. As what had been quoted by Dee,

“What pedagogical principles can and/or should inform and guide online learning?”

“The best principle is one where the student is driven by tasks, problems and engages with the content and this is how the learning happens.”

When the students have the passion to learn, spontaneously, they will enquire more and get themselves engaged and involved in the teaching and learning process.

The Mid of November

It’s already the mid of November and we are half way through the course. Still surviving but I need to do a lot of catching up though… =/

Seems like Web-based Learning in a trendy term where most people will think that Web-based learning will definitely improve or enhance learning experiences. How true is this is yet to be proven. All I know is, in order for a tool to be effective, it requires a lot of sweat and labour behind the scene. Jessica did a detailed and clear presentation with some real-life examples on the tools that she used in her lesson. In her presentation she mention about the implementation of ADDIE Model in developing a web-based learning environment. As research is an iterative cycle, with the help of a guiding model, a researcher will be able to work in a more focus direction and also identify the parts to be repeated (in case of any ‘mishap’).

Setting up a web-based learning tool involves a lot of planning and effort. Sustaining it is another huge issue. I’d always wanted a virtual platform to support my teaching and learning and I did managed to come out with a few but all ended the same fate – abandoned. I really need a strong determination and put in more effort in the planning stage so that I can continue on with the project even after fulfilling the requirement of a certain course.

Designing a Web-Based Learning Environment

Nothing comes easy… There is for sure a reason for me to prefer Facebook over Friendster, a reason to prefer a particular website, a particular search engine, a particular software, a particular presentation etc. All these lie on how those tools are being presented to the consumers & how user friendly are the tools.

From Yee Hui’s Power Point Slides, I found that there are a whole lot of details we need to pay attention too in order to produce something that is able to deliver the message effectively and also attract and maintain the audience’s attention. There is the need of 120% of effort to be able to do so. This is a great challenge.

I used to comment on the Wiki that I created looked blank, plain and not catchy. Now I know that I can actually modify the Wiki. Thanks to Yee Hui’s sharing on her Wiki. I really admire her effort and work in producing web tools for her lesson.