The time has come for me to reflect on the past six weeks of this course. I must admit the first half of the course has went by pretty fast, however not without me obtaining a host of resourceful information. This posting will reflect on five out of six units covered thus far. It is my hope that as you read these postings, you will be inspired to consider being a part of the online learning environment.
UNIT TWO: Constructivism
This unit has informed me about the constructivism approach of learning. The constructivism approach can be described as one that will allow students to apply their personal experiences or real life problem techniques to master a concept. This can be done in many ways such as when completing homework classroom assignments or during classroom discussions.
In the past many of my classes were taught in the traditional approach, however the constructivism approach of learning was present as well. I can honestly think about how some of my previously taught classes had a constructivism aspect incorporated in the class assignments.
The courses were not necessarily taught from a constructivist perspective however many of the homework assignments were created because of a constructivist perspective. For an example as an under graduate student at Prairie State College I can remember developing a portfolio that required me to gather information on how children behavior from infancy through kindergarten. While working on the portfolio I had four small children, which all under the age of four. I remember being able to observe and identify certain characteristic within my own children as they related to the textbook chapter definition words. I have taken a number of online classes since attending Prairie State College and constructivist approach would be easy to implement with the online environment.
The theory would be easy to implement because the online environment allows for discussions that could be in a narrative format (discussion board posting) or through classroom chat rooms. This theory would be excellent for some students and challenging for others.
UNIT THREE: Case Studies
Included in this unit were case studies that were interesting. This unit reading material gave me insight on the proper language that is used as it is related to online/ internet courses and traditional classroom/on ground courses. Terms such as a web-enhanced, hybrid and fully online were described in details. Having a full understanding of such terms will assist with determining which courses or what kinds of curriculum would be a right fit for the online environment.
UNIT FOUR: Learning Style Surveys
The VARK questionnaire and the Index of Learning Style Questionnaire were taken in this unit. Both questionnaires produced results of what type of learner I am. Comparing the two results together was quite interesting. According to the results I am an auditory and kinesthetic type of learner. The auditory side of me learns best by listening to lectures opposed to reading text books. The Kinesthetic side of me learns materials by hands on experiences and applying outside field work or using real life experiences to help me with understand classroom assignments. Given those results in developing online teaching courses I would use many different strategies that would cover all learning styles. For example I would pictures and charts along with giving detailed instructions for many sensing learners. In classroom demonstrations would be included along with role playing activities that would cover in classroom topics.
UNIT FIVE: Learning Style Group Projects
Completing an online group project was not bad at all. However, I must admit starting was a bit rocky because we could not get a designed time set up to discuss the assignment. However once we had our first group meeting and we agreed on how to distribute the assignment things went pretty smooth. We did not have a designed leader from the start but everyone was willing to do his or her part of the work to get the project done on time.
Here are a few specific things that went well for my group project:
- Determining how to bread down the assignment
- Creating a timeline
- private group board discussion thread
Here are a few specific things that were challenges for the group:
- Opening up attachment on the discussion board
- Setting up the first planning meeting
Group projects will be used in classes that I teach because the group projects build team skills in individuals and many can benefit from the experience. Online group projects help individuals get experience with working with different learning styles in the online environment.
UNIT SIX: Online Teachers
Two of the Arizona State interviews were very interesting in this unit to me, Mr. Barnes and Mr. Mark Montesano. Mr. Mark Montesano, was once a full time counselor who changed his profession to online teaching. His interview was one that confirmed my first thoughts about need a lot of support when it comes to converting an f2f course to an online course. This professor had someone take the time out to lead him step by step with the process of transforming an f2f class to an online format. His interview kind of relates to learning the different learning styles and learning strategies in order to be effective in using online components for all students. Mr. Andrew Barnes interview stated he gets a lot of interaction from the students. Teaching certain classes online like history would benefit the students.
Mr. Barnes transcript stated that in the beginning of the courses students send a lot of emails with questions that helps him in developing the course materials on blackboard. Not much different than a traditional classroom setup. Nothing stood out to me but all the interviews were very interesting to me. The interviews made me want to add some online teaching components to any class I may teach in the future.
We were required to interview an online instructor for this unit and the outcome of my interview was very interested. I would like to share her words of wisdom. Dr. Johnsons has been an online instructor for at least six years and she is fascinated and really enjoys interacting with students all over the world. Dr. Johnson words of wisdom are, “don’t be afraid of challenges when you first start teaching or developing online classes, because there will be some. Be assured that as time goes on they will lessen”.
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