Attendence to a webinar

For the first time of my life, I have attended a webinar (an online seminar) given by Karen Wilson. She is a teacher at the Fort Valley State University in Georgia who, with the help of other colleagues, try to integrate the use of Wimba Pronto (Blackboard) in order to facilitate students’ understanding and the availability of resources (teacher and library’s material). I realized that what is cool with webinars is that you can attend every webinar wherever you are on the planet. It does not cost money and it is an innovative way to reach people all around the world.

Here is a little summary of the activity:

Things discussed:

The first points discussed by Miss Watson were comparative results from different universities (California and Utah) that used or are still using Wimba Pronto. All of them agreed that it facilitated students’ retention since they could listen to archives whenever and wherever they want. Then, Miss Watson explained why Fort Valley State University needed this kind of educational approach in her area. She talked about how they started using Pronto and how the university progresses in this domain. Of course, they are always some modifications to make in order to achieve the former expectations, but Miss Watson says that everything is going well so far. Students’ comments about the use of Pronto for online courses are really positive. Most of the students have been helped with financial aid issues, registration issues and library services without coming to the campus. Finally, Miss Watson ended the webinar by saying that there are still improvements to do, especially in motivating students to register/to use online courses using Pronto. The Fort Valley State University aims the expansion of Pronto on a long-term period.

What I learned

I learned that Wimba Pronto helps to increase students’ retention rates, helps students who have difficulties with the content of a course and extends resources availability. All of these results help students to achieve their online courses and help them to save millions in travel reimbursements.  I also learned that Pronto was not only used for online courses, but also for admissions, financial aid issues and tutoring sessions. As soon as I saw the word tutoring, a bell rang in my mind and I thought about the program we have here at the UQTR. So, we have a similar program in Trois-Rivières that helps students with their homework. Although it is not an online course, I think it is the first step that can lead the university to consider the use of Wimba Pronto.   What I liked is that students are identified through Pronto, so the teacher can know who they are and who they say they are. The program pulls all the information from students’ CMS/SIS, thus everything is authenticated, integrated and organized.

It was really interesting and I will attend other webinars for sure!

The digital generation project

Vicki Davis is one of the people involved in the digital generation project. She uses every kind of technologies to make her students learn and to make them share ideas with the world. Google docs, blogs, wikis and even virtual life programs are used to develop students’ knowledge. Her students have to create avatars and create digital citizenship environment by themselves. She customizes the way she teaches according to students’ interest and motivation. She changes her curriculum in order to get as many enriched experiences as possible. Students learn how to learn without the traditional paper/pencil method. 

Empowerment is definitely an important aspect of this project since students must find out and figure out things by themselves. They take in charge their learning by teaching other students about what they have found in their research. They also share their new knowledge on the Digi Teen blog. Students and teachers can share information and ideas about what they have done. It allows students to have new perspectives and possibilities since the world is now accessible to them. The experiences that children have at school can be reinvested since we live in a digital society where online exchanges are made on a daily basis. This way of doing things is really motivating, especially when we know that Davis takes into consideration her students’ interests. It gives a meaningful and useful purpose to this way of teaching.  

Cultural and sociolinguistic factors are now, more than ever, present in our lives. I think it is important for kids to collaborate with other students across the world since it allows them to discover alternative ways of thinking and doing things. The importance of interacting with people in (almost) authentic situations can be realizable thanks to a variety of technologic tools.

Big Thinkers: Henry Jenkins on New Media and Implications for Learning and Teaching

Henry Jenkins is a media professor who decided to tackle the use of digital tools in school environment. He mentions two major problems; the first one concerns the use of technologies in school. He says that schools deskill the students by limiting their access to information. Indeed, some schools cannot access information because it is blocked by some filtering system in place. For instance, students cannot get information about the story of Moby Dick because there was the word “dick”.

The second problem was that some students do not even have an e-identity online. Some of them do not have access to technology at home, which increase the phenomenon of what Jenkins calls the participation gap. How can a kid get learning experiences, social skills and cultural competencies if he cannot have access to digital information at home and at school? It impedes him to be a fully participant of his digital generation and thus, he is not totally a part of it.

Then, Henry Jenkins gives some solutions to the issue when saying that teachers and schools must stop hurting and do damage to digital tools. Teachers must be open minded and be willing to explore in order to recognize the values (inside and outside the school) of online resources. In doing this, it will create a new relationship between teachers and students. If teachers have difficulty in using digital tools, they can ask for support on their own online community of teachers to help each other.

My point of view related to how people can create shared learning opportunities across generation is really positive. I like the idea that we can teach not only students, but also older generations. People can use digital tools to create relationships between generations. The example that comes in my mind is a video we have watched for the purpose of one of my classes where students were teaching older people how to use a computer. It is usually the opposite; older people teach younger ones.  I thought it was an excellent idea because it gives space to students as to show their expertise to other people. They get involve in situations that are meaningful to them, especially because they can see results of their teaching on their “new friend”. Older people can use digital tools as much as others do, they just have to learn how since they were not born in our generation. I think it can create interesting shared learning opportunities across generations.

Beyond Textbook

The video How Teachers Collaborate Online and in School talks about an online collaborative wiki called Beyond the textbook. This internet application gathers resources, ideas and LESs that can help teachers of different school districts to plan their teaching. This website offers information about different strategies or techniques to use in order to teach different concepts. A sense of collectiveness can also be developed since students know that they learn the same things as others do. Teachers can interact and discuss about what is posted on the wiki, experiment the LESs and then give their comments and suggest improvements to do. Teachers can share their creations with their colleagues, but they can also extend their knowledge beyond the classroom and even the school. The opportunity to share ideas, resources and LESs with people of other districts and people around the world is possible since the digital make it more efficient. It creates some sort of community among teachers and students who participate in the collaborative wiki. 

I think that the use of wikis to promote collaboration among teachers is an excellent idea. It offers the opportunity to share ideas, resources and comments about many aspect of teaching while reducing the workload of everyone who participates in the exchange. As seen in our readings, Kovacic and al. talk about the Hotlist as an e-tivity, which I think can be a good start to a given project. Gathering hyperlinks and resources that can be applied to a further projects is a good way to begin a topic with students or even teachers. Moreover, Paul Sze expresses that wikis must be meaningful and interesting for students. I think it is the same thing concerning ESL teachers. Topics must be challenging to deal with in order to help teachers transferring their passion and their knowledge to the students. From my point of view, it is the best way to motivate students to participate. Wikis are great tools for collaborative writing among teachers and students!

Ethical issues related to the use of ICTs - Howard Garner on Digital Youth

I agree with Mr Garner when he says that there are ethical challenges related to the use of ICTs for educational and personal purposes. From my point of view, teachers who want to integrate blogs in their teaching must "educate" students on what is right and what is wrong when blogging. Mr. Garner looked at 5 ethical issues in his Good Play Project: sense of identity, sense of privacy, sense of ownership and authorship, sense of credibility, and sense of participation.

Sense of identity is one of the first things that students must learn before and while using digital media. As Garner says, students can have numerous identities that can give them some kind of anonymity. Sometimes it can be for good reasons (cultural exchanges with other people), but it can also be harmful (if we think about rumour or pedophilia). I do not know of you have watched the movie Trust, but it is one reason why children must have the sense of identity. They must be conscious that if they can have numerous identities, other cans as well .These situations can create confusion and deception which end up being harmful.

Teachers and adults must be role models and inform children right at the beginning. No needs to scare them, but more inform them about advantages and disadvantages of using digital media.