Di\’s blog

 Before I go any further a big ‘THANK YOU’ to Anne. You have taken us on a whirlwind ride and whetted our appetites for further learning, so you have achieved your objectives regardless.

I am feeling reasonably confident with my progress and hope to keep on learning.

My journey at times has been frustrating trying to fit all in but as the old saying goes ‘ if you don’t use it you lose it’.  The wealth of resources out there is amazing and endless so this course has served to help recognise the good stuff.

I will be using a lot of the technology with work and with students assignments as they can do it on their blogs etc.

This is the end of two and half years as I transferred from CSU.

The relief is immeasurable.

So to all

Ciao! Ciao!

I am nearly at the end of my 4 hours and have discovered another part of this course.

This one has included a drag to make a sentence. The others had drag to match the words but I like this one as it is more interactive. While dragging it ends up that you are using your brain to work out the following words.

I am finding that the further that I go into the course the quicker the speaker is speaking and this from a learning point of view is sometimes hard to keep up with. I think that it may be better if there is not so much time between my tutorials as I may practise more.

Ciao

I have continued on with my course and just completed another hour. Benissimo! it is starting to get a little tiresome. The challenges are a good way of recapping the section. However there needs to be more interaction. I find that the writing is annoying as i would rather just do more of the other setups that they have. I don’t think that I have gone into it too much with all. The first part is watching a short video clip and listening to them talk, that is good as i tend to repeat as I go. The next part is seeing the word or words in large print and they are spoken, then you are given 3 translations to choose from. The word is repeated if you are right you get a big green tick. A big red cross if wrong (we don’t like them)

The other parts are to speak and write but they start to get boring so I am starting to skip bits and only do what I want.

I’m glad to only be doing 4 hours as it can get a bit mind numbing.

Uno ore to go.

Ciao!

I am finding that the format of this course is quite repetitive. It is good that I get to practise several times and that the situations are true to form. Conversational Italian is very handy but I have not had a chance to practise this in Leichhardt yet. I am too busy trying to get all my uni work done that I don’t have a life!

This will come in handy when I am over there I can see.

I am half way through this course.

Till next time

Ciao!

I have just started my lesons as I thought rather than have me nattering in class (how unusual of me!) that I would take the tme at home to start. So far I have gone through the simple words, as I said before thatit is conversational Italian.

I have found after the first 20 mins that it is thorough but sometimes a bit confusing as to what to press.

The revision is excellent as they start by:

1. going through a scenario and talk the whole situation.
2. repeat the key words with both the english and italian written
3. pronunciation of letter combinations
4. quiz on letter pronunciation
5. speak and write a scenario
6. correct the scenario

Will continue to the next step.

Have just done the second one and now at least I won’t starve and will be able to have my caffeine fix when I visit Italy.

The second one was easier as I think that the directions are a little confusing and could be a little more user friendly.

Ciao, Ciao

For all out there who think that they are over the whole e-learning thing!

A dear friend of mine has told me she is so excited as she is going to get a computer–a lap top at that !

She is 89.

She has rearranged the furniture so that it will be handy.

So next time you get annoyed, impatient, cranky etc. spare a thought for my friend.

Palloff, Rena M. & Pratt, Keith, 2001, “Lessons from the Cyberspace Classroom: The Realities of Online Teaching”’ Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.

Watkins, R., 2005, “Preparing Learners for online success”, Learning Circuits

I have found that the reading byPalloff and Pratt (2001) which was written in 2001 is dealing far more with the learning styles online and how they can change fromface to face instruction. There is an assumption that if the teachers decide to run an online course that the student will automatically know how to follow. This has not been the case as most students have sat and been taught to. It is very hard to encourage students in a collaborative environment. One word that is cropping up is ‘motivation’ as stated by Palloff and Pratt(2001) that it includes decision making styles, values, and emotional preferences. This processing and transfer of information can take new learning styles for this to be carried out. Motivation in an isolation can be very hard to find,as students are expected to take responsibility for their own learning. A students’ attitude towards the subject being taught can impress upon the discipline required to achieve the results. Teacher awareness is paramount to the success rate of an online course.

I was interested to read that the majority of students are older and working so this theory of only younger students embracing the e-learning is completely changed. Does this bring about more reflective learning as suggested? Because there is more time in an online situation to sit back and reflect, then this in itself brings far deeper thinking and so the learning style changes again.

The reading by Watkins (2005) being more current, finds a similar set of issues. He refers to the transfer of skills in the e-learning capacity in whether a student is technologically savvy to be able to participate. Adapting old skills to new. The design of e-learning courses so that a student does not feel unable to participate due to lack of technology but more to the use of what is readily available to them in the way of emails, the internet, chat rooms and such. this encourages the student to be far more interactive in their learning without the pressure of face to face confrontations. the quiet student in a classroom environment can become quite ‘noisy’ in an e-learning environment.

Watkins (2005) recommends a ‘readiness survey’ so that the student can self assess, so that they monitor their own ability. This can also be a little daunting for the student who may not want to admit inability to grasp new technology and so may hold back from a course thinking they are not good enough and this leads to lack of motivation.

I am MULTIMODAL.

This definately reflects on how I learn and teach as I try to fit with what is being delivered. My weblog layout i cannot see reflects this at all but there may be hidden clues that I am not aware of.

I like what I have chosen for my short course as it is functinal and will be used. It will push me into the ‘accomodator’ realm as I will have to do the trial and error. That will be my only hold back, as I am by nature not a risk taker.

I tend to be a bit of a mixture of styles. I tend to find that I am a converger as I do like to to have a solution to a problem, but I am also aware of the meanings and values of alternatives so this makes me a bit of a diverger. Sometimes I take on too much information and suffer from ” not seeing the forest for the trees” so this makes me a bit of an assimilator. I don’t think I am much of an accommodator as I dont take too many risks.

In e-learning this hesitancy to use trial and error is something that holds me back as I have to force myself to be adventurous. Whether this comes from an era of education where we are worried about breaking something and then ‘how much will it cost to fix?’

Other areas I have no problem with except that by wanting a resolution of a task I spend too much time on one thing when I put my mind to it.

I have just been reading the comments on the wiki and am sorry I didn’t go for more. I reead Pete’s and was very impressed. I think my wiki is just about wiki-ed out as we have been at this degree for two and a half years. At this stage I think that most are counting the days as I know that I am. I have enjoyed the experience and hope to expand a little more,