Final entry

There is an old English proverb, “there is no feast in the world that does not end finally”. Although we have been enjoying the feast very much so far, and no matter how long the feast will take, we have to face an end of it. This is exactly how I feel now when writing this final post for the blog. The blog has been very enjoyable and it has given me much more than I had expected. It is sad to see how time flies and we are already near an end of it. Although an end of this course, it is also a new beginning for every one of us, where all that we have acquired from this course will continue to be applied.

When I flipped back to the course schedule, I realized how much I had learnt thus far from this course. First and foremost, I learnt what is intersubjectivity which happens to be a new term for me. Intersubjectivity, contributes to the collaboration at a distance and has the effect of making the learning context richer. This richness can be conceptualized as a social and interactive process, occurring as a consequence of the attempt people make to understand each other overcoming limitations such as language, attitude, gender, and age. I understood this term better when Dr. Tee explained in detail. My preconception of this term at the beginning was similar to scaffolding.

Another interesting part about this class was the Wiki. Wiki was a creative approach to allow us to interact collaboratively and have a deeper understanding to develop something. Even though we encountered problems at the beginning , with Dr. Tee’s guidance and scaffolding it was more of a success as I began to know what Wiki really is .Wiki is something new to me as I can be considered a newbie in Wiki. But, now I could proudly try Wiki with my students as I know how it works and feel it is a good activity to stimulate high order skills. Besides that, I feel Wiki is not an easy task for DE learners, with so many sharing, collaborating and coming to a consensus could be really an uphill task.

Of all the aspects, one of the most significant things in this course is producing the module. It was my first time creating a module for DE. One can clearly say that creating the module requires a lot of proper planning. We come out with so many drafts considering so many factors that could have an effect in DE environment. However, in that process I learnt a lot as now I understood that in a DE module you cant think base on your instinct but think of the instructional strategy first before deciding the activities. Though there were many sleepless nights and frustrating days of thinking how to make the module better, it was worth the pain. At the end , when I tried it with my students they were able to do it independently successfully.

All in all, I must say that I have gained valuable insights in the various aspects of this course. Not only that, I would really like to express my appreciation to our dedicated lecturer, Dr. Tee, for giving such an impressive and interactive course. You never gave up on us and wanted to make us ‘thinking participants’ rather than ‘spoon-fed participants’ .Lastly, I believe that everything you have given us will be very beneficial for us in future to help our students and acquiring knowledge is a never ending journey, and there’s no designated path to follow. As Carl W. Buechner said, “People may forget what you have said, but they will never forget how you have made them feel.”

Learning Module

I just want to share what I felt of the learning module. Firstly, it is not an easy task to prepare a learning module for DE learning as we have to bear in mind so many factors and constraints compared to face to face learning. When we ( Suganthi & Me) first showed our first draft to Dr. Tee, there were many things practically we were not able to see . When Dr. Tee asked us the 'Why' questions , we were like Dr. Tee has a point, 'why didn't we see that earlier' or 'yes student might not understand this'. Dr. Tee's comment was an eyeopener to me in many ways.

Perhaps, when we were doing our module we were basically thinking of how we would do it with our students in classroom( face to face) and using that expereince to create the module. As Dr. Tee said when you are doing the module think of the instructional strategy and not based on your instinct. However, another constraint we have is the technology itself, as we are still grooping with new advanced technology . It will be like we had decided to assess the student in a specific way but not sure if such technology is available, so we resort to the ones that we know for sure. I guess in this sense it is of advantage for those who has a good background of the technology .

Anyway, so far we have done nearly 10 times of changes and drafts. In fact after seeing the presentation of some groups this week. we again saw teeny-weeny things which we could improvise. It is really an uphill task but not an impossible one if we have the time.I really have my hats off for those creating programmes for distance education learners.

Today's Technology

In this presentation what interest me was learning of the new technologies which I did not know existed online. For instance the Acrobat Adobe Pro Connect. It was a new discovery and wanted to venture more of what it really is. However, it would have been really beneficial for us if the presenters could have showed us more on that than just touching on the surface. It was the same with other technologies which was introduced merely stating maybe a detailed description would have helped us . This is because i'm sure most of us wanted to venture and apply with our students when we create a DE environment in the class. As I have mentioned earlier, we could try and test all this technology in our classroom to see if it is effective and perhaps students could use it when the teachers are on courses or not in school.

However, both presenters managed to create an interactive teaching by posing questions and activities.

Benchmark- Fazu & Mosayeb

In this presentation , Fazu & Mosayeb did try their level best in explaining to us the meaning of benchmark how to differentiate between benchmark and standard. Though there were some areas that can be questioned and not clear but both of them finally managed to achieve their objectives. As for me, I could now define what is benchmark and I felt the introduction was good example of benchmark though the presenters did not manage to utilize it to the fullest . However, the activites were good as it related to our daily activites which made us understand better the terms. I feel Fazu's working expereince has helped a lot in making this presentation a success since she could relate and explain what is the process that happens.

Overall, it was a well done job by both of them as they did come prepared as this topic is not an easy one to tackle.

Evaluation

This week was suganthi's and my presentation. The preparation for this presentation began one month ago. We identified three articles for this topic. First and foremost we read the Chapter 13 in the textbook many times since it was not easy to understand. Anyhow, I did create the first draft of the powerpoint based on the Chapter. Then, I went further to read three articles and synthesize the relevant and important information which was our second powerpoint draft. This was still the beginning stage of getting what is important to be presented to our freinds related to the module we are going to create. We added and deleted many slides before we can our fairly completed draft . We showed and discuss with Dr. Tee the draft and his advise pick and choose what you want to present and what you think your freinds should learn from this topic . It was not easy to choose which is to be included and discarded . Finally, we came out with the final copy after nearly 12drafts of powerpoint.

We were kind of nervous on that day as we wanted to create an environment that our freinds were actively involved and should be able to understand what we were trying to present. As teachers, I guess all of us would want our students to be able to understand our lesson. One thing, I learnt from my Form 4 Biology teacher at the end of the lesson she will ask us to sum up what she had taught for the day. So in her class I use to remember we use to be alert and make sure we know what she was teaching because everyone of us has to stand up and say at least a line of what her lesson for the day was.I liked the approach she used and I do use with my students so they know what the objective of the day.

Anyway, it was a relief when the presentation was finally over and I would like thank all my freinds who participate actively and gave full co operation in all the activites we conducted. Thanks to Mosayeb who participated or rather made him to speak as we seldom hear him giving his views. Maybe being the 'rose' among the many 'thorns' in the class he is shy to say things.

I would also like to thank Dr. Tee for guiding us in this presentation.

New Wikispace- Learninghaven

This week we also had a forum like to discuss our wiki which is sailing without direction so far. We brainstorm ,list out the problems and suggestions to overcome the problems. Finally a new wikispace called learning haven was born to help us . The new wiki is very much a 'baby' which is very much guided and taking us one step at a time .Dr. Tee is trying to help us by guiding to complete our wiki. The new wiki is very much easier for us to go through and relate to answer the given questions. This week we are supposed to 'play around' with this new 'baby' learninghaven.wikispaces and then answer these questions .

What do you think of the new "how people learn" wiki?
I think the new wiki is more structured and guided to help us to answer the related questions. The activities given in the wiki consists all the levels in bloom's taxonomy. Now I could relate better what the question' how' actually wants. The video though takes time to download but very helpful in guiding to answer the activites.


What helps you learn?
A really good question as I need to jot down things as that helps me to learn. Besides that using analogy helps me to learn better because I could understand any concept when I use analogy.Listening to lectures can help me to learn when I take down notes of what the lecturer is saying. Participating in activites also helps me to learn better because I'm relating to what I had listened or written down.



What gets in the way of your learning?
Well , one if I'm not prepared for the days lesson than it gets in the way of my learning as I don't know the head or tail of what input is being given to me. I have to read beforehand or not I will be lost. Another thing that could hamper my learning if I do not certain skills . For instance you are required to read the information given in the excel chart. If I m not familiar in using excel than it will be a problem to me.

'Copyright and distance education' and ' Managing and leading a distance education organisation'

Normie and Maryam did a good job in presentation this topic. It was not an easy topic especially Chapter 12. I was having really hard time understanding the chapter thoguh I read it twice. My problem was I could not relate to what we were doing. My style of understanding something I need examples which relate to what we are doing. That is the reason when Dr. Tee explains something using examples or analogy it is easy for me to comprehend and instal in my memory box. Anyway, back to Normie and Maryam, I liked the set induction on copyright was very captivating and related to the topic. Only setback is perhaps normie could have emphasize more on the gap filling she asked us to do. I could not get all of it as some part of the video the words/phrases were not clear to me. But not matter a good set induction. This Chapter made us see how unduly lose is the law in our country when it comes to copyright, we just take it for granted and copy right without any considerations compared to other countries who take seriously matters pertaining copyright issues.

The second part of Maryam's presentation I liked her layout of the presentation which she inserts all the information in diagram form. However, I did not really understand the managament part though I could see Maryram was trying her level best to explain. Perhaps one of the problem was the language. Maryam should have just used BM if she felt she would be comfortable explaining in BM.

Overall they did try their level best and was good considering the fact that this chapter was not an easy Chapter.

Assessment DE

I was a bit confused with the term assessment and evaluation during this presentation . To my understanding I thought we use the term assessment when it is for students' performance and evaluation is more for the instruction, product and implementation. However, when Dr. Tee explained it was clearer to me that evaluation is the big umbrella term and under it we have the assessment and measurement. The analaogy used by Dr. Tee made it easier for me to understand the terms. In short, both assessment and evaluation can be used interchangebly. Besides that i would like to share how I remember the formative and summative assesment. When the chef taste the soup, it is formative; when the diners taste the food it is summative ( Robert Stake, 1976 )

Pedagogical approaches and instructional strategies

Hi, I'm back after a long hectic week which I hardly could breathe. Anyway, glad to be back in my blog. First and foremost a thumbs up for Lim and Chun who really did a good colloborative job in presentating their topic. The use of visual for the instructional strategies was interesting and till today I could remember them. I feel the use of visual is very helpful especially for our students. My own expereince at the moment I'm using graphic supplement to teach novel to my students and I find it is really beneficial as they can relate better the story .

Besides that, I enjoyed the debate though it was kind of controversial as the judges did not really take a stand but rather had their own views. However, the brainstroming session in the group before we debated was good because we were looking from so many different point of views. At times it made us to think hmm... we can also look things this way which we did not realise at the beginning. One more activity that was enriching was the problem solving but it could have been better if we were given more problems as when we are solving the problems, in real we are applying what we understood from this topic.

To be honest, at the beginning when I read the chapter, it was not clear at all as I didnt understand what the chapter was all about. But when LIm and Chun presented it was clear and was telling myself such a simple thing to understand but the text book made it so difficult to comprehend.

Overall, good work Lim and Chun and your sleepless nite preparing the presentation is finally over. Mine , yet to come !

Understanding Distance Education Learners

Hana and Iza did a good job in presenting this topic. I did try the VARK thrice but the results were different each time. Anyway, what we could sum up from their presentation each and every individual have different learning styles and to cater a module which satisfies everyone is an uphill task. Thus, Distance learning provides a new challenge for the teacher: his or her teaching method has to meet the needs and expectations of many different learners. The teacher also has to develop an understanding for the capabilities and needs of the students without personal contact and direct working experience with the participants of the course. Well, maybe at the beginning it will be difficult to cater for all but gradually with on going evaluation on the program, system and learners will be helpful in creating a good module at the end.

Besides that we had also a round table discussion about our class wiki. I felt the discussion was good , at least everyone was able to share their views and the problem with our wiki. Personally, I feel the wiki is good it makes us to share our thoughts and also synthesize the information we have. We just need to organise the content and I guess after that we can keep the ball rolling, Dr. Tee.

Planning

We started the second session with a good set induction from Dr. Tee. A role play which was interesting and managed to make us understand all the processes involved in producing a module. I did read the chapter he assigned but was having hard time to understand the model. However his role play really helped me to understand what is involved in producing a module. Gosh , it is not easy and proper planning is really important so we don't go wrong and start all over again. Dr Tee gave us useful inputs on ADDIE model and the significance of evaluation in every step of the way. However , I was kind of loss when he explaining on the 4 layers of SECI model.

Anyway, Suganthi and me were thinking of doing a module on literature which we could use with our students. In fact, I feel it will be very useful because if we are not in school attending courses or anything else the students could study using the module we had prepared. We will be creating a distance education environment in school which will be beneficial for everyone. Well, we are still brainstorming and searching for materials before we finalize things.

Hi Dr. Tee

First and foremost let me honest with you. The first time my freinds and I were scouting around what course to sign up for this semester we were not sure what course is this. So, I mailed Hui Wan and asked her. She was all praises for you and also said you are a pro and specialist in this area. On top of that she is also described that distance education is something like what we have in Open University and Wawasan. She encouraged us to take as we will be dwelling and learning something which will be useful for us teachers. Well, with all the recommendation from her, I thought I would give a try and was very impressed with your first class. You made learning very easy and interesting. I liked your movie clip of the Apollo and how you related it to transfer of learning. Very fascinating indeed! I'm looking forward for this course as I really would like to know everything about distance education. I had been an examiner of the Open University two years ago and marked papers but I myself had questioned the validity of the marking scheme.

Your class is really very informative, interesting and eye opener in many ways for me.