PCM

Moodle MOOC8 reflections

Moodle MOOC 8 (MM8)took place from May 1 - 31, 2016 on Moodle for Teachers and on Integrating Technology Online Academy on WizIQ. The purpose of the MOOC is to connect with educators for instruction and learning, reflective practice, social and collaborative learning, cultural exchange and peace, personal and professional development, community building, best practices and challenges involved in teaching with and without technology, student engagement with the content, peers, and the facilitator, and learning to teach online with Moodle course and learning management system.
MM8 includes webinars and Moodle training. The presenters of the webinars will focus on connecting online for collaborative learning and teaching with technology, education technology, professional development, and topics that pertain to teaching and learning online and/or on mobile devices/smartphones.

Reflecting on 5 webinars

This event  gave to me the opportunity to be connected with the other attendees.There were many ways to cooperate and to have an exchange. Speakers and tutors have been approachable and supported learners with their comments and especially by examples.I participated in most of webinars,but sometimes  work engagements prevented me from taking live sessions, so I watched recordings.

An interesting point about personal and personalized learning I found in a work of Dr. Ebba Ossiannsson. The needs of a complexity of a world today must be met with diferent set of a capabilities of modern students. The biggest on students learning occur when teachers become learners of their own teaching, and when students become their own teachers...that is something that I would say to my coleagues.

 

Anticipating the needs of learners in virtual worlds, a webinar by Dr.Nancy Zingrone was another event I found very interesting. A questions about pros and cons, positive and negative sensations that students experiences in VW are the questions frequntly in a practice of teaching in VW.

 

Reflecting on teachers behaviors on social media by Kerin Heuert Galva. Important questions teachers must ask themselves is not shall I use social media, but how do I use them. The comunication area of 21. century learners is moved almost completely towards social networks. So whats writen there is what counts, we have to ask ourselves will we understand eachother in the future and how do we meet that new way of comunication.

 

How to use moodle in the English Classroom by Eduardo Lina. I found Eduardos story very familiar. Listening to him I recognised the same problems I have in my practice. The work in e-learning wery often looks like Siziphs work(roling a stone uphill) and when you reach some point theres allways a ministry to unhelp-same here(Serbia) and same jn Israel-ppl just wont undrerstand.

 

Moodle MOOC 8 Week 4and trough all the weeks of this course we were here for the sake of each other. And that is the greatest thing of m4t courses and events, learning from eachother in interaction

with coleagues from all ower the world. With the constant suport from Dr.Nellie and her team-the sky is the limit.

I enroled this course with more than 8 years of experience in work with moodle, and what I was looking for was the experiences and ideas of my coleagues from all ower the world-and I found it!

Thanks again Dr.Nellie.

Blocks on MOODLE-Moodle MOOC8

Activities on MOODLE by A. Popovic(Moodle MOOC8)

Reflections on SLMOOC2016

The third annual Second Life MOOC (SLMOOC16) took place from April 1-30, 2016 on WizIQ/SL. The theme of the current MOOC was peace through learning and connecting online for instruction and learning via web technologies such as Second Life. The MOOC was  focused  on connecting online for collaborative learning and teaching around the world through Second Life. The live presentations included the speakers’ reflective process on teaching and learning in fully online and blended learning formats.

This event  gave to me the opportunity to be connected with the other attendees. All partecipants introduced their first life and second life avatar in an introduction forum. But there were many ways to cooperate and to have an exchange. Speakers and tutors have been approachable and supported learners with their comments and especially by examples.

After all, the level of partecipation in Second Life by schools and universities suggests considerable confidence that the application really does effectively combine technologies with the quality of a shared space. So I convinced myself that virtual worlds allow students to interact in 3D spaces. I didn’t imagine how many educators pursue hundreds of experiments to elucidate the elements of a meaningful educational experience in fields ranging from music to the sciences to history.

I partecipated in most of webinars, especially in SL. But sometimes,  work engagements prevented me from taking live sessions, so I watched many of them registred on YouTube Channel. After the Opening Dance, when many partecipants got to know one another, my first lesson has been in the Community Virtual Library: there I knew for the first time a virtual world and its possibilities for teaching and learning, guided by Valery Hill.

Gentle Heron guided to the heart of some interesting questions, for example How virtual ability supports education, educators and students, contributing to a positive behavior change. A more applicative lesson about Easy methods for making exceptional online videos took place by John Orlando. He showed how effectively use some video presentation tools (I immediately tested them!).

    

I still want to mention Learn in town; an example how learning by doing (in this case by listening) can be useful to learn english as L2. Fundamental the lesson of Nancy Zincrone about Resouces for teachers in VW. 

 

Therefore the first challenge I might encounter in implementing this way of teaching is to involve colleagues in a cooperative work.

To do this, I would show them the real potential of VW, perhaps taking them on tour through some of the most interesting places in Second Life. I am certain that they would be exited about the opportunities that virtual environments can offer. VW enable teachers and students to work together synchronously and then return, individually or as a team. The learning space is always available, not just for geographically dispersed groups but even those who meet regularly in the physical world. This is particularly useful when students require more flexible schedules or need to work asynchronously on the same project. But what is fantastic is that virtual environments help to diffuse a learning component or entire programs exclusively in immersive learning worlds.

This is what I would like to do in my future, amplifying teaching and learning beyond capabilities afforded by teleconference calls and web presentation tools, but also training simulations. What’s better? Reading about Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel in a book or walking through the chapel doors and flying up to the top of the ceiling for a closer look?

Here I would also like to mention Just talk sesions with Nancy Zincrone in a relaxed way we talked about our experiences and plans in SL.

Anyhow thanks Nancy and thanks Nellie Im back... 

 

 

CSU Kruševac 20.-21.02.2016.

CO16 reflections

Connecting Online is a free online conference that takes place on the first full weekend of February. CO16 is a collaborative, inclusive, world wide community initiative that involves future educators, leaders in schools & colleges, and business' involved in training at all levels.
The virtual conference will be held online using WizIQ platform and would be hosted by Dr. Nellie Deutsch. The theme of CO16 is ‘Teaching Online to Improve Instruction and Learning in Education and Business’.

It would be a treasure trove of amazing insights and experiences of leveraging the power of the internet for instruction and learning. An event that’s not worth missing for anything in the world!
Topics and Highlights of CO16
Connecting online to improve instruction and learning
Online learning and instructional experiences
Experiences with technology in face-to-face and online classes.
Best practices: What worked and what didn't work?
Challenges involved in teaching and/or learning online
How do you use technology to promote your online workshops, consultation, and communities?
Books written on e-learning
Business Models for Online Teaching
Marketing Online Courses

 

During webinars it’s been possible to connect with the other attendees and at the end of each webinar speackers gave answers to attendees’ questions.
In this edition the questions that I found more interesting were about suggests for a correct and professional use of a teacher website and about the way to use online teaching to earn money
 I followed thoroughly this appointment and I watched almost all webinars. I noticed the great variety of arguments, all very interesting.
Some presenters (Jaime Miller, Chris Rush, Susan Brodar et al.) treated about their experiences as online teachers, suggesting how to avoid the most common mistakes and how to have a right approach with technologies and in the relationship with online learners.

 They insisted particularly on some key issues: tools must be intuitive and reliable and a good website must be easily consulted by users.

I found very interesting the lesson about flipped learning through mobile devices (Dr. Revathi Viswanathan). I think  it's a new way of teaching that considers the students as an active part in the learning process. And it can be considered as a way for the teachers to enjoy themselves. Flipped classroom is not just a new technique, it is a new thinking method. Another good point is made by teacher when he says it is very important to know the content that needs to be online and how to organize. Another way to interest students can be to bring real life into the classroom, just as  Stephen Greene teached in his lesson. It can be possible if music, arts, actuality and all aspects of real life are rapresented with technologies, but also with the rapresentation, rielaborated by students and their creativity.

Also in the lesson of  Rosmery Ribera, teacher gave many suggests to be a successful online student and it seems that an oriented use of multimedia can contribute to this result during a process from motivation to reflection. Young people, but not only, have familiarity with Facebook, Twitter, … and this social network can become a good support for teaching.

 Dawn Alderson in particular reflected about the use of Twitter in teaching, for the level of involvement in which learners can be engaged. For my experience I can confirm that in effect students feel themselves more inspired to study and to use technologies for their formative success. They know anyone can read what they write and so they’re also more controlled and careful in their comments.

Theodora Papapanagiotou believes that socialmedia give great opportunities. She is persuaded that collaboration is the strong point for teachers to achieve Future Skills 2020 for a globally connected world. For this purpose she attends all online environments she can (networks, blogs, groups…) and collaborates with other teachers all over the world in production of educational
Also Karin Heuert Galvão in her webinar wanted to explain that collaboration in teaching is the best behavior that the community of teachers can adopt.

After all in his conference from India, Ramesh Sharma emphasized how is important to create a learning society (that is also the title of a book written by J. Stiglitz and B. Greenwald), specially in a world more and more digitalised, in which readers use increasingly tablets and e-books. So he and  Theodora Papapanagiotou say it’s necessary to think how to work for a social intelligence, a new media literacy, a transdisciplinarity, a cross cultural competency, a design mindset.
The conference that I particularly liked  was by Letizia Cinganotto and Daniela Cuccurullo about Techno-Clil.

 To know and to use an additional language for learning and teaching of both the content and language is an entitlement but also a necessity to become global digital citizen. Skills can be achieved by literacy and the goal is fluency in creativity, information, media, solution and collaboration. Teachers were very inspired and communicative.
The event finished with the conference about using Amazon Echo for your Online Teaching Needs by Brian C. Steinberg.

During the presentation of all possibilities that Amazon Echo offers, for few seconds we appreciated some notes of a great Beatles love song called “. Amazon echo’s been only the last but not the least of a series of online resources that are presented during all webinars by presenters.
I admit to be very interested not only as a teacher but also as a learner because I’d like to wide my perspectives and learn about new ways of teaching.
I find the contributions of the presenters so interesting and inspiring, as they put so much effort in creating all these new materials and constantly re-think their way of teaching.
I felt great admiration for them, specially for their abilities and their practical approach to consider teaching profession. Hearing them, makes one rethink their ways of teaching. First of all I was stimulated to think back on my own teaching experiences. Now I know I want to implement some of the ideas I have heard by presenters in webinars, but I can imagine it won’t be easy.
In my opinion key factors should be considered an intelligent content design, consisting both in a simple and clear website and progressive problem solving activities, but also in an appropriate time management and in the availability of the resources.
The challenge demands a great initial effort and a large investment of time and resources to be productive.
CO16 was a very interesting collection of experiences!
As an atendee I had a great on-line expirience and I would like to express my gratitude to the moderators of this event Dr.Nellie Deutch and Rob Howard.