LESSON LEARNED AND FUTURE PRACTICE

This reflection marks the end of ONL 192 journey. I can point out three important key issues Things I struggled with during the course, lesson learnt and future practices

Time is one of the struggle among things that I really struggled to beat. I have to plan and replan for me to be able to achieve what was needed of the course, the course is intensive and extensive, had to fix my timetable, I was supposed to attend meeting, I have to read blogs, I have to read  articles for me to understand topics and have inputs to to the group. Sometimes tasks were assigned on individual basis, so I had to make sure I complete it so that I dont lets down mu team.

There were so many new tool I had to make sure I familiarize myself with them in order to approach the topic, make presentations, brainstorm the course and sharing to the larger community.

The course take time and energy, happy that was able to go until the end, Along the way I was able to conquer a lot of skills, knowledge and wider attributes such as the effective deployment of various online collaborative tools such as Padlet, Zoom, Coggle, Prezi, Slack,  among others in learning and teaching.  

Tools for collaborative learning deserves special attention for effective networked online and collaborative learning.

I also learned about the importance of testing new tools  to for every topic, but relevant one. We should not sound monotonous through the courses, I learned about effective design and implementation of online and blended course, values of open course to student, teachers, and society at large, how to access open educational Resources, effective engagement of students in a learning process

Other thing learned apart from the course content is, taking initiative in collaborative learning, proper communication(we used wattsap group as a way of maintaining communication on timely basis), caring, taking away shame and shyness, respecting each ones idea, using bogs as a way of sharing our thoughts and reflections on topics, openness and trust to each other, and many others

The expedition for ONL 192 was so interesting and joyous. It was characterized by worldwide participants with brilliant experience. I have many skills to take with me towards effective teaching  and learning at my institution. 

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DESIGN FOR ONLINE AND BLENDED LEARNING

Another amazing topic of the ONL 192 iteration is design for online and blended learning, for me topic was core and import,  I gained many skill and knowledge on how to design an online and blended course.   One of the important components to consider is how an online and blended learning approach will address emotional engagement for learning. Emotional under this context comprise, hope, pride anger, shame, boredom and hopelessness. All these are significantly related to academic achievement, student motivation, learning strategies, self regulations and value appraisal (Perkin eta al., 2010)

During the discussion in our group every one shared his/her experience regarding the designing of online course. Some have experience in design, facilitating online and blended but few of us have no experience at all… It was a very nice and practical session, one of us brought a course which was under design we used it as case, we gave our comments and input especially the part of emotion engagement

Emotional engagement in the online learning

Emotional engagement is a student’s involvement in and enthusiasm for online learning. When students are emotionally engaged, they want to participate in school, and they enjoy that participation more. There are strategies that can be used for increasing student’s engagement in online context such as increasing positive motivations and decreasing negative emotions of students: increasing intrinsic motivation, self efficacy and self regulations of students, improving cognition, and increasing higher order of thinking.

Pntaraki and Burkhoder, (2018) pointed out the following emotional strategies and techniques to employ for online and blended leaning

          I.            The use of anticipated or self referential feedback

       II.            The effect of culture emotions

    III.            Creating courses with high task  value

    IV.            Cognitive strategies

       V.            Behavioral strategies

    VI.            Collecting and analyzing students’ engagement data.

Instructional Design standard for better E learning

In designing blended and online course we need to consider for major components namely; course purpose, objective purposes content, methods to be employed and learner who is a main stake holder of that particular course. Therefore, (Chatia, B., 2018) pointed out the following standards with are essentials for an effective blended and online course

•  Identify the purpose of the course 
• Framing instructional objective
• Aligning content with objectives
• Deciding on strategies to facilitate learning
• providing practices with feedback
• Engaging interactivity
• Learning assessment

Design online and blended topic together with previous one covered in this iteration provides a better way and effective implementation  of an online course for my students which will significantly add me with potential pedagogical approaches.

References

Chetia, B. (2018), Instructional Design standards for Better E learning. Availale at https://blog.commlabindia.com/ (Accessed: 07/12/ 2019)

Pentaraki, A. and Burkholder, G. J. (2018) ‘Emerging Evidence Regarding the Roles of Emotional, Behavioural, and Cognitive Aspects of Student Engagement in the Online Classroom’, European Journal of Open, Distance and E-Learning, pp. 1–21

LEARNING IN COMMUNITIES

Constructivism is a learning theory found in psychology which explains how people might acquire knowledge and learn. It therefore has direct application to education. The theory suggests that humans construct knowledge and meaning from their experiences. From this perspective, Learning is a social activity - it is something we do together, in interaction with each other, rather than an abstract concept (Saul McLeod, 2019 in Dewey, 1938)I too believe that, learning is a social activity.  For example, Vygotsky (1978) believed that community plays a central role in the process of "making meaning." Thus, all teaching and learning is a matter of sharing and negotiating socially constituted knowledge.

The concepts of community learning reflects how human being  depend from each other in a learning process, the need interaction and collaboration with each other in a well networked environment and this what happens through the ONL 192

Topic three was very interesting, we discussed and learn so many things such as the importance of collaborative learning, how to constructive knowledge collaboratively, how to manage collaborative learning (Pedagogical approach), skills needed for effective community learning, and challenges of community or collaborative learning.

Sources of challenges of students involved in online collaborative learning can be

•          Perception of an asymmetric collaboration among the teammates   
•      Lack of shared goals among the team members
•     Imbalance in the level of communication
•     Difficulties in communicatio

•     Lack of instructors’ support/orientation and

•      Problems in reaching consensus (Capdeferro, N.,& Romeo, M. 2012)

Emotion words listed by academic writers; words size is proportional to frequency (n 1223)

These challenges can be avoided by supplying a learning environment that facilitate social interaction, collaboration, effective support in technology and should be provide with enough information about the online learning models in general in order to allow them to adjust their expectations, preferences and decision making concerning their enrollment in online learning.

Despite of all the challenge of online collaborative learning, it should be noted that learning communities has been marked as key feature of the 21th century in schools especially higher learning institutions. Lichtenste and Wakings (2005) pointed those significant outcomes of student’s participation in learning in communities, such as higher retention rates, integration of academic and social skills experiences, higher intrinsic motivation, lower risk of withdrawal, increased cognitive skills, gains in multiple areas of skills and overall satisfaction with the college experience.

In conclusion, I would quote one of colleague contribution during the brainstorming session of topic three "Failure, errors, and mistakes can be very important not only in the group's socialization process, but also as a way of dealing with power asymmetries that can otherwise be hidden in effective groups. the process of failure can be important when you learn in cooperative ways- because you learn new things, unlearn and rethink about things that are taken for granted" consider that online collaborative learning is dynamic, there variations across communities, culture, belief, understanding and so forth.

I SUPPORT LEARNING IN COMMUNITIES BOTH ONLINE AND BLENDED MODE.

Reference

ennett, J. M. (2015) ‘Learning Communities’, The SAGE Encyclopedia of Intercultural Competence.

Bolliger, D.U. (2004). Key Factors for Determining Student Satisfaction in Online Courses. International Journal on E-Learning, 3(1), 61-67.  https://www.learntechlib.org/primary/p/2226/

Capdeferro, N., & Romero, M. (2012). Are online learners frustrated with collaborative learning experiences? The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 13(2), 26-44.

Lichtenstein, M. (2005). The importance of classroom environments in the assessment of learning community outcomes. Journal of College Student Development, 46(4), 341–356.

Watkins, C. (2005). Classrooms as learning communities: A review of research. London Review of Education, 3(1), 47–6

Saul, M,,(2019). “Constructivism as a theory for teaching and learning” available at https://www.simplypsychology.org/constructivism.html

Wu, J. H., Tennyson, R. D. and Hsia, T. L. (2010) ‘A study of student satisfaction in a blended e-learning system environment’, Computers and Education. Elsevier Ltd, 55(1), pp. 155–164

Sharing and Openness in Education a way to go?

Sharing and Openness in Education a way to go?

The issues of sharing and openness were discussed in details with colleagues in my group.

I personals feel that, Sharing educational material and research works is a way to go now; it makes material and research works available to broader community, reduces the barriers to collaborative learning through data sharing, transparence and attribution, reduces duplicates in educational materials and helps to remove bias in our understand of a particular subject, enables others to build upon new ideas right away, whenever and whoever they are.

When I Read about openness and sharing research in a blog post by so called, F1000research which is platform for open sciences/open data, they discussed some reasons as to why researchers are reluctant to share research data openly; A common explanation is there is a limited academic benefit to them in sharing, plus curating data takes time and money, so beyond a public good argument, they feel there is little incentive to share. Furthermore, for the researchers who work in low-income countries, they have said that they feel that by sharing their data before they have had a chance to fully analyse them, makes them open to exploitation by researchers in high income settings. To put it bluntly, they feel like data exporters.

The pressures of research assessments are also another limiting factor. For example, in the UK, the Research Excellence Framework places much burden on researchers to seek high impact journals, with limited focus on the implementation and benefits to the public. If assessments were more about the implementation, making better use and re-use of data and collaborations across disciplines, then we may start to see a greater demand for sharing research data in its entirety

(https://blog.f1000.com/2019/10/24/challenges-and-solutions-to-sharing-health-research-data/)

Way Forward….

If we want to eliminate the challenges brought about by sharing and openness some action are to be takes by every stake holder like researchers, public, funding organizations, charities, academic institutions and industry.etc.

We need to look at changing the culture to support and embrace openness, transparency and inclusivity. If the value and kudos of sharing are equal to the demands of institutions and/or research assessments then we might begin to see a change outside of academia as well.

Everybody has a responsibility to ensure that materials and research works are shared in a robust, safe and efficient way. If we can ensure and demonstrate that works are protected in a secure way, then the boundaries on withholding are weakened. Creative common policies are best way to securely share resources.

Finally, funders have a key role to optimize the value of material and research works  sharing and institutions can enable academics to enhance the movement for sharing and openness  to be or part of normal practice. 

Reference

(https://blog.f1000.com/2019/10/24/challenges-and-solutions-to-sharing-health-research-data/)

I WAS NOT DIGITAL LITERATE THOUGH I WAS IT LITERATE…..

When I started working at University as an academic librarian, I had a knowledge and skill of information literacy. I taught how to search information, how to evaluate and how to use it accordingly. I could not use technology (online platforms) to teach, I could use tradition methods with power point presentations. Later, I was challenge by the management to utilize learning platforms available for teaching and assessment.  The starting was very difficult since I had no idea of these platforms and Tools. The university had Moodle platform yet I didn’t know how to use it for effective teaching

I consulted colleagues for some training on how to use it. I get used to some features and continued to self learn others.   Slowly I became confidence with it and start looking for more collaborative platform. Again I was introduced to Google docs, with this im able to review students work on real time basis. I collaborate with colleagues in research works etc. what next……?

I see there are many online tools for the same purpose but some I have many doubts on its reliability and sustainability. Security issues…..?

Developing skills, competences and confidence for going online using particular tool, needs time, energy and passion.

I Used to read different blogs, but I was hesitant to use it in the classroom (Fear of unknown)..…. Now Im challenged by ONL 192. Hope will start taking it  to the Class. I have Face book account but don’t feel safe using it  as class,  drop box  as well but  I use it for social activities and personal, I never thought they  are reliable tools,  to use for serious matters.

Inspite of being IT literate, Digital literacy is calling upon the ability to identify (find), evaluate, create and communicate information.  

There various tools for online collaborative learning, but in the end we should, able to identify one which suit ones environment.

I Enjoy the first topic: DIGITAL LITEACY.

INTRODUCTION

I am Deodatus Sabas

Assistant librarian/lecturer at Muhimbili Univrsity of Health and Allied Sciences.

I have masters degree in information science

Teaches Information and learning Technologies to  first year undergraduate students

Trains faculty and postgraduates students on Open access and Open science/data

Trains on reference managements tools..etc.

I want to know how to work collaboratively by using online tools tools available and to use them.

I am Looking forward to learn more from you in PBL4 and ONLl92 at large.