Musings and resource for E-learning

We have shared many tools throughout the semester and provided and received feedback from peers and instructors.  Effective evaluation of discussion learning is very challenging – whether online or face to face.  I will continue to seek formal and informal instruction on the evaluation of this and other components of online courses.  This graduate course is a beginning – an introduction to the possibilities, but not enough practice and learning to become a truly effective evaluator of student performance.

ePortfolios are becoming ubiquitous in higher ed.  There are some shining examples of effective use of ePortolios by some institutions (Alverno) and some programs (teacher ed usually).  Learning about effective use and evaluation of ePortfolios will be a priority for me.

The effective evaluation of student learning is time consuming and requires significant mental energy.  Unless administrators, department chairs and boards of regents are sincere in their commitment to evaluation of student learning and the workload required to do that, instructors will have to take a more expedient route and continue to use auto-scoring, multiple choice type assessments.  I will also continue to seek professional development on the most effective use of this type of assessment.

Here is a resource from Colorado Community Colleges on assessment

Assessment wiki from Colorado Community Colleges

It’s good to evlauate learning objectives and the assessment of them and to critically reflect on the tools used – we have a tendency to get a little over-the-top with the myriad of tech tools available.  If on-ground teachers all put this much effort into their course planning and assessment, and thoughtfully used web tools to support that, we would have much better instruction.

But – is there reward (and motivation) for doing this? Careful course design is a great deal of work, and although there are efficiencies from year to year, the work is not boiler-plate.  I am proud of my well designed courses, excellent success with online instruction and consistently positive student feedback .  Good teaching requires a lot of intrinsic motivation.

Good feedback this week from the professor – reminding me to be as friendly as possible to online students – I know this, and it really does pay off.  Thanks for the reminder.  Another good practice in online teaching – be redundant.  This is the link to my final assessment project for this class (also posted as its own page)

Cyber coaching, a technique that gives frequent and formative feedback to students using simple inline tools is intuitively a great way to build student confidence and foster deeper learning. However, it isn’t very scalable – at least not in the form described in Cybercoaching: Rubrics, Feedback, and Metacognition, Oh My!, Naomi Jeffery Petersen, Ed.D.
Indiana University South Bend School of Education.  Even frequent discussion feedback in a class of any size, becomes a 24/7 project for an online instructor.

Some research shows the use of cyber coaching for pre-service mentoring and I can see a great possibility for this in some professional programs.   The course that I am enrolled in, Assessment in Elearning does demonstrate some aspects of cybercoaching where students submit early drafts or ideas to a discussion forum where they receive feedback from peers and the instructor.

More on assessment – there is an extremely wide range of tools available for online assessment. If an instructor is lucky, they will have access to an LMS  with many assessment tools.  The automation of some assessment gives instructors some efficiency in their assessment and gives students some consistency from module to module in an online course – something that I think is important, particularly at the K-12 or undergraduate level.

As usual, each topic sends me on extensive self-discovery. This week’s gem is a 21st century take on Bloom’s taxonomy, Educational origami.   See this great wiki resource  Educational origami

Evaluated a case study this week that highlighted effective and not so effective use of learning objectives and assessment.  I was confused by what the instructor intended in this case study and how a student would know what to do and if they had done it correctly.  I come from a laboratory science background, very precise and orderly – so it is not uncommon for me to struggle with the world of humanities and liberal arts.

The course (journalism) appeared to be very thought provoking,  learner centered and focused on deeper learning. It had a lot of breadth and depth, which might mean that it is too much work for a single semester ( i.e. – the course and 1/2 syndrome).

Good questions to ask are:  What do we want students to be able to know and do and how will we know that  they have achieved that objective?  How will students know what constitutes good work and what will we do to help them work to their best ability?

It takes a lot of organization to write learning objectives for all units, to tie those to course goals and assessment and to keep it all organized.   I remember being very confused by this for a long time and still can feel overwhelmed.  The work of Barbara Walvoord has been helpful.  Walvoord, B. (2004). Assessment clear and simple. San Francisco,CA: Jossey-Bass.

View my interpretation of the learning objectives in this Casey case study

What fosters a lively online discussion?  Adding to the conversation, opposing,  questioning, bringing in a new perspective, these all encourage ongoing interaction.  My favorite discussions include those where additional resources are introduced. I can spend hours reviewing the postings and resources  in a good, rich discussion.

The discussion on Curtis  Bonk’s perfect E-storm generated the most activity of all of the discussions thus far in the Assessment for E-Learning course. However,this may be due to increased student comfort in the discussion forum, and less optional discussions in this particular module.

Some peers did post provocative and thoughtful comments. There was a fair amount of single sentence, “I agree” type posting, too.  The discussion feels a little more focused on disatisfaction with technology tools rather than the effective use of what is available for assessment in e-Learning courses.  The perspectives brought in by those in very different environments IS quite useful, though

I have never been a fan of concept maps, mind maps,  graphic organizers or whatever a person  might call them.  I’ve worked with a number of the programs and even taken professional development on their use.  Why is this?

There is a fair amount of discussion about the validity or lack of validity of learning styles theory.  But I do think that some people are just wired differently.  My background is in medical laboratory science.  The ability to follow SOP in a step by step fashion is part of the training – and most of us in this profession have that skill.

Would I use concept maps as an assessment tool?  I think that I might, because I can ask learners to be explicit about the connections and linkages of all units.  I did notice that having  an exemplar of a completed project was very helpful. I plan to incorporate this technique into my own course modules as much as possible.  You can see my concept map linking learning objectives and assessment after this post.

I also  reflected this week on trends in technology, trends in enrollment in online programs in higher ed, issues with pedagogy related to that online movement and lack of resource to make it all happen.  A well thought out online course design can result in a much improved product over a face to face lecture course. Students are not able to passively absorb information, (in other words, the information dump model) but must participate, hopefully collaborate, construct their own knowledge, seek and provide resources.  Some short-sighted advisors in my college call online instruction the “pajama courses” implying that the only true advantage to students is the convenience of attending class in the pajamas.  How sad is this for all of the dedicated teachers and faculty out there who are knocking themselves out to provide high quality learning experiences, using modern technology and engaging multimedia and authentic assessments?

Curtis Bonk, a well know leader in e-Learning published an article in 2004 entitled The Perfect E Storm, emerging technology, enormous learner demand, enhanced pedagogy, and erased budgets. Although the discussion of emerging technology was interesting and relatively relevant considering this article is over five years old, the learner demand and pedagogical change required to meet that demand are much more critical. Too often we hear, I could teach online if only someone would put the class online for me.  What does that mean?  Won’t the instructor still create the content, arrange the learning activities and assessments, interact with the students and adjust the course if there are adjustments needed?  I need to think about this some more.

Curt Bonks blog

Readings this week define educational blogging and examine their use as a means to foster cooperative learning and develop learner centered assessments.  I am familiar with blogging,  but have never really thought through the process of how to use blogs as assessment.  I plan to use some type of electronic record that can be self and peer assessed in a class that begins next week.  I began the week with a general idea of how I might use this activity for assessment and finished the week with a completed project that supports the general education learning goal of the course that I am teaching.  I guess that would be my AHA moment.

Blogging has been around for a long time. I remember going to a conference a number of years ago when people were invited to blog about their conference experiences  and thinking it was something strange and mysterious.

A key reminder for me this week is the concept of being clear and transparent with students regarding the purpose of electronic assessment projects. This week I told my own students that the semester-long blog project would require them to reflect on their own learning, to collaborate with their peers, to make the evidence of their learning public and to share ideas and resources and to evaluate each other’s work (peer assessment).

I am excited about this project and believe that it will bring authenticity to a learning activity that bordered on superficial in prior years.

1/14

I am fine with Wikis but find that they are not the preferred method of collaboration for my students. My biggest frustration with ALL collaborative communication tools is the large number available, the need to join, the forgetting log-in information, remembering how each works, and a few other things.  Wikis can feel disorganized, too.  I do like the features of collaboration products that send messages when updates are made. Ideally, I will find an online collaborative tool that will pull many features together – sort of a one stop shop. I’ve worked with blogs more than wikis and am now experimenting with the Google Wave Beta product.

Response to peers:

I think that Wikis make fine assessment tools when looking for student participation, contribution to the final product, addition of resources, etc. and a rubric that guides their work is very useful.  Depending on the Wiki software, they don’t always allow for the more multi-media aspects that students gravitate towards such as blogs.  It really depends on what you want the end result to be and how students should get there.

Here’s a resource that allows you to compare the features of many wikis. It doesn’t show you what they look like, but it might be helpful.

Businesses are one thing, but school districts that refuse to allow collaborative web tools are not serving their students well. There are wiki tools that do not have advertising and that can be private and controlled by the teacher. The teacher-librarians in our school district have taken the lead on this. I am a member of the school board and am working on policy revisions to accomodate student safety while still working on 21st century technology.

Sue is a teacher, a working mom and an active outdoorswoman.  Professionally, she is a technology specialist at Northeast Wisconsin Technical College.  In her personal life, Sue is the mom of 3 and is married to a science/math teacher.  Sue has years of experience in helping faculty implement technology in their eLearning courses. She brings all of this knowledge to share with the class.  We are glad to know Sue.

Partner Interview Sue Zittlow

You can read my partner interview and find out more about me on the ABOUT page.