EDUC3325 - Week One Reflections
Hmnnn . . . you just never quite know how the first day of class goes from a teacher perspective.
We only had 10 of the 17 enrolled students show up. This may be partially due to the fact that we usually have a number of U of C students in the course and classes don't begin at the University until next Monday.
On a positive note - everyone seemed to be engaged in our opening activity about reflecting about a "powerful" learning experience. The students appeared to enjoy having small group dialogues about their experiences and then examining the characterisitics and/or features that made this learning experience "powerful" to them. I had each group report back, using flip chart paper, and then we compared our list of characteristics to Chickering & Gamson's (1987) Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate education - the importance of a relationship with the teacher and respect for diversity of learning approaches was noted in the students' comments.
I then got the students into new groups (numbered them off) to review the course outline and come up with a list of questions about the course. I was impressed - no question about "How do I get an A in this course?". Instead the students were interested in getting further clarification about the assignments - specifically the Web-based portfolio, WebQuest and Group Teaching Workshop. I mentioned to them that we would also be using Wikis and Weblogs to support our learning - but these were "new" tools for the entire group. I did add that we would be "hopefully" collaborating with Dr. Debra Hoven's education class in Australia with these tools - and that brought the "light"back into everyone's eyes.
I finished the evening with a review of the major features and tools in our course Blackboard site. Everyone was able to logon and navigate the site with no problems - a "first" for this course. They first checked that their correct email address had been entered into the system, then they "created" their Home Page (future teaching aspirtations and interests - digital image to come next week), "played" with the online discussion forum and then complete a "beginning of the semester" survey (that I adopted from a version at the University of Waterloo). I'll be sure to "link" the survey results to this Blog - when all the students have completed the survey by next Monday night.
Next steps . . . get the students ready to create their own Blogs next week and work with Margy MacMillan (Instructional Librarian at MRC) to provide an orientation to the Internet based lesson plan assignment.
That's a "wrap" for this week :)
Norm
We only had 10 of the 17 enrolled students show up. This may be partially due to the fact that we usually have a number of U of C students in the course and classes don't begin at the University until next Monday.
On a positive note - everyone seemed to be engaged in our opening activity about reflecting about a "powerful" learning experience. The students appeared to enjoy having small group dialogues about their experiences and then examining the characterisitics and/or features that made this learning experience "powerful" to them. I had each group report back, using flip chart paper, and then we compared our list of characteristics to Chickering & Gamson's (1987) Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate education - the importance of a relationship with the teacher and respect for diversity of learning approaches was noted in the students' comments.
I then got the students into new groups (numbered them off) to review the course outline and come up with a list of questions about the course. I was impressed - no question about "How do I get an A in this course?". Instead the students were interested in getting further clarification about the assignments - specifically the Web-based portfolio, WebQuest and Group Teaching Workshop. I mentioned to them that we would also be using Wikis and Weblogs to support our learning - but these were "new" tools for the entire group. I did add that we would be "hopefully" collaborating with Dr. Debra Hoven's education class in Australia with these tools - and that brought the "light"back into everyone's eyes.
I finished the evening with a review of the major features and tools in our course Blackboard site. Everyone was able to logon and navigate the site with no problems - a "first" for this course. They first checked that their correct email address had been entered into the system, then they "created" their Home Page (future teaching aspirtations and interests - digital image to come next week), "played" with the online discussion forum and then complete a "beginning of the semester" survey (that I adopted from a version at the University of Waterloo). I'll be sure to "link" the survey results to this Blog - when all the students have completed the survey by next Monday night.
Next steps . . . get the students ready to create their own Blogs next week and work with Margy MacMillan (Instructional Librarian at MRC) to provide an orientation to the Internet based lesson plan assignment.
That's a "wrap" for this week :)
Norm
posted by Norm Vaughan | 5:53 PM
4 Comments:
Hello,
I am a part of Dr. Hoven's class I hope that this link will work as this is my Web Quest that I have just finished creating using Web Garden. I am sorry but I do not know how to post a linnk in a comment. If you go to my Blog you will be able to see the link there. In case here is the URL.
http://www.webquest.org/questgarden/lessons/
32023-060803235347/ It is Kylie's WebQuest on Debra's Blog.
Hello Norm, I am another one of Dr Hoven's Masters students. Certainly looking forward to being a part of all this exciting stuff. I have just completed my WQ and it is on Debra's blog called Helen's WebQuest. This is all a first for me and being a vintage model I know I will improve.
Good to see someone else going through similar angst in the first class of semester! :-) Sounds like you're hitting the spot, though, Norm.
As you can see from my students' comments, we're looking forward to this collaboration too! some of the Webquests my students have produced are about Brisbane, so your students might like to peruse them once they get over 1st week shock & begin to get their bearings :-) The rest of my students should have their webquests posted by the end of this week, so I'm working on hosting them on my own homepage as well as internal to the university to facilitate easy access for your students to view them. You should also remind your students that mine are Masters level, so there will be discrepancies in age & experience ... though not, of course, enthusiasm!
Hello Norm,
I'm yet another of Debra' Hoven's co. from Down Under. When I first joined this course, I knew next to nothing - now I 've learnt enough to realise 'IT' is great and I CAN learn how to use it.Your students will be feeling like me very soon!
Anushka.
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