End of term...

This term has gone by very quickly, but it has been very productive. The class blogs were, by and large, good examples of reflective posts. The teachers became much more active in posting on each others' blogs. Some were master commenters, adding comments to as many as 10 blogs.

The final projects also reflected a range of expertise and access to technology resources. Some people hoped to be able to get a data show to use in class, while others were already making use of the one-computer classroom fairly regularly. Most impressive were the creative ideas for using cell phones in the classroom: sending audio, text files, exercises, and the like to students. A lot more students have cell phones than have computers, so it's a great approach to take.

What I'm really hoping to see is ongoing communication among the participants. There was a lot of wonderful sharing during the class: web sites, solutions to problems, and comments on each others' ideas. The Nicenet site will remain open, which allows class members to email each other individually or as a group. Those who are following other people's blogs will be able to see new posts, if any.

I'm also hoping to hear from the participants as they try their project plans. They will certainly have both challenges and successes - as in all teaching. With enthusiasm and dedication, however, I'm sure they will find ways to create satisfying learning environments for their students, encouraging their students to become more enthusiastic about learning (including English) and more independent learners.

It's been a fun 10 week!

--Deborah

Starting Week 2

It's been a lot of fun seeing people begin to work on their blogs. For some people, it worked easily; for others, it is taking more time and effort. Still, I think that it will be worth the effort. Our group discussion on Nicenet gives people a closed circle of friends/colleagues who are reading their ideas. This is great for our class discussions. The blogs, however, are something different. Creating a blog is sharing with the world (if you've set the blog to be visible to everyone). It is authorship in a very different way from a post in a discussion board. It provides a "real" audience of anyone, not just the captive audience of a classroom group.

The global reach of blogs is also a caution. I've reminded the teachers not to put their email in any blog post unless they want a lot of junk mail. We've also talked about how much of one's profile to share, if any. Not sharing a profile allows for much more personal privacy, though it's also possible to be selective in what is shared publicly. Setting one's blog so that it is not listed in Blogger or searched by search engines also increases privacy. If you are not linked to something that the search "bots" know about, then your blog won't be found.

Week 1 got us going - I'm looking forward to where we go next, with Week 2.

--Deborah

Orientation and Week 1

We're going very quickly so far this term. I opened the course for orientation week on the 28th of September, and the teachers have been very active in posting already. As a result, we're moving blogging from Week 2 to this week, Week 1. There are three blogs so far that all look pretty good. I have high hopes that this group will do very well with their reflective blogs and with the rest of the course.

The key now is encouraging people to respond to each other, not just to the discussion prompts. I'll need to think about ways to frame the questions so that they encourage people to interact with each other. Each person has a lot of expertise to contribute to the group, so it's a matter of enabling better intra-group interaction. Food for thought.

I will probably restate some of the prompts from last week and add some new readings - we'll see if that helps.

All in all, though, it's been a very good start!

--Deborah

Getting ready

I'm looking forward to this term's Building Teaching Skills course. Unlike in summer, when most of the teachers weren't in class, this term they will be able to try some of the techniques and tools with their students. I think it will be much easier to see what works this way, as well as what needs to be adapted.

We'll see how it goes!
--Deborah