I logged onto the OB site armed with my password and my bits of printed paper I complied yesterday with butterflies the size of elephants. The reason I am undertaking this course is because I can no longer teach vocally due to an operation I had to have last year which although saved my life, change my profession for ever. Online teaching will be the only way I can carry on my profession for the rest of my life, so I want and need to get this right.
Initially everything seemed quite simple until I could not find the learning activities page and then when I logged on to the announcements the web page had gone down. You get an overwhelming sense of being lost and that you need reassurance. I am consciously thinking of how my students may feel and if they feel lost would they lose interest and walk away without engaging with the experience? I am thinking of ways to ensure that at the beginning they do not have this sense of feeling lost and unsure of how to use the system.
Other problems I have encountered so far at 9.26 is that I cannot change my visibility to available, is that because its me so I am not available to myself or have I done something wrong? The other thing is that tying to install Wimba Pronto the programme failed and now I can’t log on at all?? Umm a little bit frustrating. I have e-mailed the instructor as I didn’t want to post online for everyone to see that I cannot use the system first time round! (9.32) Waiting for response. It’s actually quite frustrating as I had got myself in the mind set of working through tasks and learning and now I have to wait to carry on. I must bear this in mind to give the students enough tasks to carry on with so they don’t lose interest in the course.
During the induction I undertook a task called, ‘managing my time’, I completed the course as I love taking tests and 5 minutes later the grade result was out and I am pleased to announce that I got 5/5! My geekiness has returned with vengeance. I like having small tests like this as it gets the interest of the student. It was only small and very quick but it does make you feel like you have achieved something.
Writing this log reminds me of the MA Academic Practice course I took at Bournemouth during my first days of teaching and I really enjoyed that so its looking good, as long as I get the installation upload things sorted.
I have done the worst thing, I have look at the tasks on week 1 and I want to complete them already! I must not rush ahead!
I have just had a reply back from the course tutor about welcoming me to the course, one of the first tasks we were asked to do was to post a hello in the arrivals room. So that is working and I have been exploring more of the site… (9.43).
The tutor got back to me and asked to clarify a few issues, apparently there are always teething problems. This makes me think that we will need to get the IT guys on board for when the course goes live so that if the students have issues I can refer to them as well. I thought the response time was excellent and makes me relieved that it is not me but perhaps a system error.
Whilst the issues are being sorted out. I have created a blog for this to go on! http://clarechambersonlinelearning.blogspot.com J
No comments:
Post a Comment