read chat            Critical friend portion for Jen

I am a facilitator in the Adult Connections in Education Program, which is a program for students with intellectual disabilities.  Students attend the program to increase academic skills and personal development . The program recruits over 100 UPEI student peer volunteers to study, go to fitness, work on the computer or take in class notes. 

First of the week: Went through all of the Educuational Technology resources we were given, clicked on each icon in Alec's course sheet list of ideas.  Did not see any that caught my attention in relation to the ACE Program, but learned alot. Searched for ideas and sites with new information and free downloads. 

Took Dave's advice, think about my teaching context. Started brainstorming, what would improve the program. This summer's to do list was to develop some type of training session for peer volunteers.  It is hard to train peers because of the high number and varying schedules.  Peers sign up throughout the term so they do not all start at once.  The best way to give peers accessible training access would be some web based method. Thought about researching podcasts or some form of video because I thought that may be interactive for the students. After talking to Dave and Kent Villard, UPEI's e-learning specialist, they recommended a presentation may work best.  I also wanted to track the peers to make sure that they did access the training.

Uploading a presentation or other file to Moodle

Rationale and advantages:

- training tool

- wanted a tracking mechanism

- large  number of peers, not all available to meet at the same time for training due to student schedules

- they sign up at different times throughout the term and semesters

- accessible

- complete on their own time

- modern, blended learning

- fast and easy

- will use more than once a year

- can access from cell phone or ipod

- closed system, secure, used at UPEI

Disadvantages:

- may not have an accoount

- may encounter technology problems

- may not take it seriously or access it

I know how to make presentations. James Reddin is a counsellor on campus and he gives training to other peers within Student Services Diversity office on the topics that I would like to cover, this includes ethics, confidentiality and inclusion.  We could incorporate his information into the presentation

Thought moodle would be a way for peers to access the presentation because they have moodle accounts.

searched web for info. on how to upload a file to moodle. Moodle is curriculum based, teacher centered, students respond, a closed system and secure. UPEI website, open access, not closed, webinar?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG4Wetgkwuk, this is the site that teaches you how to upload a file to moodle (just over 5 minutes)

Step by step instuctions for those of you who would rather read than view video

1A. make a power point presentation practice page, save to desktop

1. access moodle, login in, go to ed366h course

2. go to turn editing on, in top right hand corner of page we created,

go to the numbered section with your name.

3. in your section under add resource, open and click on link to a file

4. scroll down, choose upload a file, browse, open

5. upload file, upload the dessktop presentation

6. can take a minute, once done will say uploaded

7. to pick file, click the word choose, in the file you want, not file name

8. to keep the page navigation, scroll down and click, keep page navigation

9. scroll down, click, save changes

10. Done, you will see it on the home page, turn editing off

 practised uploading files to my moodle page

 didn't know if this would be interesting enough for the class, mulled it over

still looking for ideas, what do I want to acheive with ACE students and the program?  Lots of fun things for personal use.

needs to benefit my learning, Ed366h learners, ACE students

all in all wasted alot of energy and time. Still learning did occur along the way.  I tend to analyze things too much. I am working on that.

Ideas- student portfolios, worksheets, peer training

Kept coming back to worksheets, found new to me software, Cue Card 1.5, this is a great tool for the program facilitators to help the students study, they can edit and change it while working with peers, gives the peers direction as to how to keep student focus through interactive study. ACE students can use it to study independently and that can be overwhelming at times for students.  Seems like a win, win, ED learners can adapt it to suit their programs. The level of learner can be adjusted, good tool for studying, in class activity, builds on computer literacy and reading skills.  More fun and interactive, students enjoy using the computer and learn fast on it.  Use for test review. Can print off sheets  to work on at home. This can help to empower students, build confidence.

Cue Card 1.5     Developed by Wade Brainerd 

posted info. to training manual, here is the download url

http://www.download.com/CueCard/3000-2051_4-10075304.html?hhTest=1

Rationale:

 simple navigation and tool bar, student and instructor access, interactive, can be fun, like a game, chance to use the computer and it is hoped this activity will make studying more fun and enable students to have a longer attention span.  Can give them  to do list for computer time, which at times can be under used, more motivated to learn.

Uses:

 studying course material, test and exam prep and pre-test

can be used when the student is on their own or with a peer volunteer in study or computer time slot. 

Can increase reading skills and computer literacy

can adjust the level of difficulty

can be used for individuals or a group

the program works with students and records scores so that they can keep track and be responsible for their own learning, empowering to students

builds on strengths and concentrates on areas of weakness

printable, can do at home

can adjust the level of difficulty to suit the level of the individual

many students are not comfortable with studying on their own, this be be overwhelming and they may not sknow where to start

you can make it interesting with pictures and sound, this may increase motivation to learn

is good for any age level

can use for EAL learners

uses more than one learing strategy, audio, visual, kinestetic

can use a part of a class lecture as an activity and compete

is a good way to incorporate blended learning

Thought I may not be able to have the class experiential component in Cue Card because everyone would have to download it and that may not be acceptable to Colleen, home room instructor.  I spent some time uploading a file to moodle from Cue Card that I prepared, so I thought this would be a way for everyone to access that file and interact but they still needed to download the software.  I could just involve the class with the cards that I had prepared. 

Monday night: decided to present upload file to moodle, because it is a good starting point, then will refer to Cue Card and have pasted the url for the class. This will expand on the class knowlege and I will know how to do it since we use moodle at UPEI, I should get familiar with it.

Was deciding on how I was going to present. slides? Because Jennifer's material was so easy to follow and the class wasn't confused. The class appears to like linear.

Tuesday night:  Decided not to make slides or get too orderly.  Will provide more than one route. The class would learn best through self-direction. This will be a good practice run for me also. I will give them options and they can decide. Not be the sage, engage the learners in curriculum choice.

The plan:

Talk about moodle skill and Cue Card tool. Rationale for choosing these. 

Give the class options: can do one or the other together as a group or none and they learn them on their own time using the information I have posted.  Websites available or just experiment in the card file I had made. This idea sounds good. 

While planning this presentation I did learn alot of other terms and tools by researching how they worked and what applications would be useful.  I learned that, we all tend to overprepare because of fear of not doing a good job and making a good impression on the class.  We tend to go with the old standard of teaching because most of us were taught we are supposed to be the experts.  If we don't come across as experts then we will look as though  we haven't provided the material.  As I keep learning, it is better to have the student take ownership of the learning and become actively engaged.  This way they will learn more.  You can only facilitate learning, you can't make someone learn something.  Growth occurs out of chaos.  I spent too much time looking for a topic.  Once the topic was decided, everthing else fell into place. 

When I did the presentation it felt good to give the learners a choice as to what they wanted out of the presentation.  Sometimes when the class is very quiet, you think they are not interested in the topic, this is not always the case.  It is good to give the hands on approach to make sure learners can navigate the tool and work out the glitches.