by Gone Into Rapture
sheepfilms
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸

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Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her

Discoholic 🪩
dirt enthusiast
AnasAbdin

shark vs the universe

❣ Chile in a Photography ❣

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Andulka
will byers stan first human second
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Jules of Nature
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda
d e v o n
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@desdemina
by Gone Into Rapture
Education is a means to an end #vglmooc
I was playing the videos from Week 5 of the Video Games and Learning MOOC on Coursera in the background while doing some paperwork that was simple enough that I could divide my attention. Then I heard Constance Steinkuehler's voice say something that hit me so hard I had to rewind and listen to it again.
This is not verbatim, but the gist is this:
We need to stop thinking of games as a way to accomplish our educational goals, and start thinking of education as a way to accomplish their goals.
If reading, researching, working math, whatever, if kids see it as a way to be able to do what they want to do, then they'll put in the extra effort to do it. I don't mean "finish your homework before you can play video games". But they will read well above their grade level (according to Steinkuehler) if the information they are reading will help them play better. I bet you'd find something similar when it comes to figuring out player stats (math).
Why don't kids work hard to do math problems in a book? Why don't they make an effort to comprehend what they're reading? Because they don't see the point. They don't care. Grades are not enough to motivate kids (see the Learning Beyond Letter Grades MOOC).
Admittedly, sometimes students are going to have to learn things that they don't want to learn or don't see an application for. We all do. That's life. But when choice is possible, give students some choice. When it's not, help them see an application, find a way to connect, to care. They may not care how long it takes a train leaving Chicago to pass another train coming from California, but they may very well care how long it takes to get to The Blasted Lands from Elwynn Forest.
MOOC update
I'm getting started on the E-Learning and Digital Cutures MOOC being offered by the University of Edinburgh on Coursera. I really need to reign in my MOOCs because I'm going to start the second Quality Matters course this week, and since I paid $350 to take that training, it gets priority! But this one has such great ratings, I'm going to try and participate as much as I can.
I've kind of let the Learning Beyond Letter Grades MOOC go, as far as submitting assignments. I'm still going to tune in to the live webinars because they are interesting, but I just can't devote the time to doing the assignments right now.
I'm keeping up with the Future of Storytelling and Video Games and Learning because they take very little time each week and are so wonderfully organized and presented.
I really want to keep up with Science & Cooking, but it requires a lot of work, so we'll have to see. But it's the course I know the least about and most want to learn, so I'm going to try.
I need to remember that I am taking these courses because I want to, and that they were free, and it's ok if I don't finish them all. But I'm such a perfectionist, it's hard to let go!
"If a child can’t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn."
- Michael J. Fox
Badge MOOC Complete!
I finished the Badges: New Currency for Professional Development MOOC. It was fantastic! Developing a badge system is more involved than I expected, but Mozilla is really working to make it easy.
Although the live sessions are over, the MOOC is still available and you can view recordings of the sessions. The community is still alive and well on Twitter and Google+, and you can still work on and earn badges for completing Challenge assignments in the course.
I have completed all of my Challenges! If you would like to see my final project, you can see it here: Beth's final project
Science & Cooking: From Haute Cuisine to Soft Matter Science
I signed up for this course because I love cooking, I want to get better at it, and I thought that understanding some of the science behind it would help me improve. But, wow, was I unprepared for the amount of chemistry! I haven't had chemistry since 1985 and I didn't do that well in it then. But, I don't quit easily and I'm sticking with it!
The first lab assignment was to calibrate our ovens by seeing at what temperature sugar melts. Sugar should melt at 366, but I had to crank my oven up to 390 to get it to melt! I'm not sure that's enough proof for me to adjust my cooking temperature, but it may be enough to have me go buy an oven thermometer to verify the sugar test.
10 posts! I'm such a badge nut... :)
Video Games and Learning
So, I signed up for a MOOC called Video Games and Learning on coursera.org. I almost dropped it because, lets face it, I'm taking way too many MOOCs right now! But I read something about it, where someone was saying it could be the best MOOC coursera has offered, so I decided to give the first week a try.
WOW! It is very cool, very fun (I mean, where else do you get homework of playing a video game?), and informative.
Ok, I'm keeping this one.
Our first assignment was to play a video game we had never played before for at least 30 minutes, preferably in a genre we don't normally play, and then create a review (less than 60 seconds!) looking at how the game structured learning. It was really hard to stay under a minute! (I went over a few seconds)
Want to see my video? It's here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lYl53vPEvM
Personal Learning Networks (PLNs) discovered
I've been hearing the term PLN for a few years now. I kind of thought I knew what they were, but I didn't really know how to go about getting one. I thought it was like a mailing list or a club or that somehow I had to have a list or a space where everyone in my PLN congregated.
But I've come to learn more about PLNs and they're not that structured. It's really just a fancy term for "making connections with other people who share your interests and learning from each other". It doesn't really matter where you make contact, and they don't all have to be in the same place.
Wow! I have a PLN and didn't even realize it! I like to attend webinars and I make note of the Twitter handles of the presenters and other attendees (if they share -- and if they don't, they're not good candidates for a PLN anyway!). I follow hashtags, like #edtech, and I see who makes interesting and informative posts and follow them.
I started retweeting some of their posts, adding my own comment sometimes, and people started following me!
So there it is. It's not something complex or confusing, and it's easy to start. So little risk, and so much to gain.
Connected Educators and PLNs
I've been hearing about PLNs (Personal Learning Networks) for a while, but really struggled with how to form one. How do I find other people who share my interests and that are willing to talk to me?
I think I've been kind of building one without realizing it was what I was doing, but I wanted to become a little more systematic about it.
And then I heard about Connected Educator Month. There are several sites with activities to help you connect with others and to build your PLN. It seems that a lot of activities are focused on K-12, but there's enough out there for us postsecondary folks that I think I can benefit.
I've started an Annotary folder to collect websites and articles related to my connected educators and PLN exploration this month. Feel free to contribute!
If you're interested in getting involved with Connected Educator Month, I recommend starting with Connected Educators. I'll be writing some more about my activities and experiences during October.
Dropping Another One
MOOCs are kind of like an all-you-can-eat buffet. If you put something on your plate and you don't like it, you don't have to eat it or feel like you've wasted your money.
I was really excited about Google's Introduction to Web Accessibility. Although I already know a lot about accessibility, it promised to teach about ARIA and some of the coding tricks, which is an area I need to learn more about.
(Note: There was a heated discussion about calling the course "Introduction to Web Accessibility" when it focused only on accessibility for those with vision loss, but I won't beat that poor horse again here.)
Badges: New Currency for Professional Credentials
I'm really enjoying the Badges:New Currency for Professional Credentials MOOC that I'm taking through coursesites.com. It's sponsored by WCET, Mozilla, Blackboard and Sage Road Solutions. I'm not sure how to give you a link to the course, since I access it through my coursesites account, but you can follow the conversation on Twitter by looking for #openbadgesmooc.
There are live seminars every Monday and so far they have been great. I thought I understood badges, but there is so much more to them, especially the Open Badges.
What I Learned About How NOT to Run a MOOC
I have decided not to continue with the How To Teach Online MOOC. And it's kind of funny because I am stopping because of so many things I learned from them about how NOT to teach online.
I'm writing about my reasons for stopping not to whine, but to share the problems hoping they will benefit anyone wanting to offer an online course.
#1 - Lack of organization
I'm not saying that every online course has to use an LMS. But LMSs do provide structure. There is no "landing" page for this course that gives you the overview and directs you to the different components. It's a blog, and not just a blog for the instructor, but one that any participant can post to. So when you go to the URL, you see the most recent posts, but no guidance to the course.
#2 - Registration Information
I could not find information on the site as to how to officially register for the course. In order to post to the blog or receive the verification for completing the course, you must register. Clearly, some participants found it, but I still haven't. (Edited to add: I found out that you cannot register once the class started. This is fine, but needs to be communicated.)
Web Accessibility Audit
I'm taking a MOOC from Google called Introduction to Web Accessibility. Although I know a lot about web accessibility, this is on a level I don't know that much about, getting into the code, HTML5 and ARIA. I'm really excited!
The course doesn't technically start until next week (at least that when Google folks will be around to help and answer questions) but you can go ahead and see the Unit 1 information and activities.
To get started, I downloaded ChromVox and Accessibility DeveloperTools into my Chrome browser. (Of course it's centered around Chrome, it's a Google course!) Then I used them to take a look at my own website, bethcase.com. I built it using Drupal and have not paid special attention to the accessibility. I'm still learning how to customize Drupal to do what I want. So I was a little scared to see how it did...
How to Teach Online - Intro
How to Teach Online - Week 0
Me in a nutshell -- I'm an Instructional Technologist for a community college system. I oversee the quality assurance for some of our online courses. I am also working on my dissertation in Instructional Technology, with an interest in adult online learning.
So you might think that I wouldn't need a course in How to Teach Online. But I like to see what others have to say, I always learn something new I can pass on, or that will help me in my own work. And I hope that I can share some of my own knowledge and experience.
I think one of the challenges of this MOOC is going to be keeping from being overwhelmed. They admit that they are providing many more materials than anyone can possibly read/watch/listen to. And there are so many participants, there's no way that I can possibly read everyone's blogs and posts. I think it might be easier if the participants were subdivided, maybe by industry (K-12, higher ed, corporate, military, etc.). Although I tend to be very participatory, the number of posts are already overwhelming.
Sensemaking Artifacts
How To Teach Online - Week 0
I'm a little behind on this MOOC, which is not surprising given how many others I'm involved with, not to mention my other responsibilities. You'd think I would already know this topic well, since I'm working on my doctorate in Instructional Technology, but I'm always curious to see how others teach it. I always learn something, see something from a different perspective, find something I can pass on.
This course asks us to do create things called "sensemaking artifacts". I've never heard about this before, but I'm intrigued. See, I told you I learn something even from courses in my discipline! The basic idea is that it's something you create, like a blog post, video, podcast, whatever, that shows how you came to understand something, put two ideas together, connect things through your own understanding. Then you share it with others. And the idea is that they learn from you, they comment, critique, contribute, and through that interaction, your knowledge and understanding, as well as theirs, grows and deepens.