Facilitation and Evaluation part 2

To Be an Elf

the end is here!


My Final Thoughts
I have enjoyed this course. From the start I knew I knew a lot, but if you can not learn from anything or something then I don't think you should be in the teaching/training/facilitation game.

What is my biggest discovery?
Interesting question.
In 2002 I went through the discovery game called The NSW Quality Teacher Award. Part of it was about reflecting on my teaching. It was an enlightening process (BTW I got an award). At the time I made a statement I still live by: If I stop learning - I should be dead.
And I still maintain it is true.

What has that to do with an eLF?
Everything!!!!!
I have been involved in online delivery for about 8 years, so some say I know all about it. I get asked to be a mentor on panels for just about every form of online delivery technology that comes out.
But I don't always accept!

How do I really feel?
This year - mostly ahhhh!!
I am drowning in technology.
How do I program this new HDD TV recorder? I get a call from a friend - how do I get my new adobe stuff to work on my new PC? (That was why I missed the last session. What I thought would take 2 hours took over 3!) and yes I did get the recorder to work - now how to edit the recording so as only to keep the bit I want rather than the extra 2 hours worth. O well some thing more.
Back to the question. TALS, moodle, mahara (sounds like a desert) and some other new thing that Beth Hobbs showed me yesterday.
More and more to learn.
But, what is it all about?
Achieving a result - hopefully successful - for the student.
What should I use? - what works for them!
Do I want the new technology? maybe
Do I have to be perfect with it before I use it? no - lets give it a go.

How did I learn? by playing
Did I have time? no - but I tried to make the most of what I could get.
Biggest lesson? on reflection, I was spending up to 3 or 4 times the amount of effort I thought I was doing per student. This was big!!!!

My main evaluation tool? the telephone. I would ring the student and ask how I could improve it? they are usually truthful - I had one person tell me it was all crap! (he had just failed and did not quite do any work!) - but I still looked at the material and changed from totally using wikiversity to including a textbook.

What did I enjoy most about this course? The Monday ( and occasional Thursday) get together on Adobe Connect.

My biggest appreciation? The Facilitators: Kerrie, Deb, Jenny and Phil - I, at least, appreciate what you did during the semester. I felt for you every time the technology played up.
Why do we do it? For the learner. For our learning.

Will I keep doing it? you bet ya. I am already collecting my students for next year.
Will it be better than this year? I hope so.

What is the most important bit to know? ...
... that we, the facilitators should be driving the technology.
... ... that we should be leading by example and taking the learning environment forward...
... ... THAT is the goal. To use the tool to get the student to participate.

Should we be comfortable? Not totally. To be comfortable brings complacently, bring laxity, and short cuts. Therefore the learner can suffer.

Thanks guys - twas good. if only a few more could finish!
also posted on the WSI eLF4Us wiki - today 17/12/2009

I made it - I got to the end.
But I still don't have pointy ears
and definitely will not be wearing the green tights.

Facilitation and Evaluation part 1

To Be an Elf

the end is nearly there


What is Good eLearning
As we near the end of the eLF training the final segment is on evaluation.

The last edition of the "Professional Educator", Vol 8 No 3 Sept 2009, Australian College of Educators, has a really interesting article (reflection) on what is good and bad elearning. (from Page 10)

A very good question!

Has it to do with technique? the attitude of the learner? maybe some element of the facilitator or is it the technology? More about the article in a minute.

The further we have travelled this semester, I have found myself pondering on this very thing. A week or so ago I (and a co-facilitator) received a thank you card and box of choccies from a certificate 4 Web student who has just completed the course. The comment in the card is her evaluation (- I might copy it and post the picture on my elf page)
Nothing major in that except she was in London and we in Wentworth Falls. This makes my most distant elearner.

What made the difference with her that others haven't got?
We used electronic files sent by email and wikiversity and a couple of books for the materials; questions asked and responded to via email - that 10-11 hour time difference was a killer! Only once did I have what could be considered an email conversation with her - late evening our time - and several emails flew around the world in a very short time. Almost like we were on the phone.

But was it good eLearning?
I think so.

Too often people try to replicate the learning as if it were a normal class room group and plan accordingly and then get frustrated when the learners are everywhere between week 2 and 18.

For me the value of elearning is that it allows the learner the opportunity to engage with the learning in a way that they want, at a time they want, at the speed that they want. It is about their learning and we as facilitators should aim to keep them on their target not ours! This semester I have lost (as in can't find) 2 (what I class as remote) students. I have no contact info - have spoken to both - one from Victoria and one from Bankstown.

Am I concerned? Yes. But there is almost nothing I can do but wait on them to get back to me.
Luckily - I found 1 - she had moved and said sorry for the lack of contact - she will restart next year.

But at the same time I have several others: The one above, a diploma student who is about to finish his IT Diploma (Systems Admin) from the Reserve Bank in Sydney and a fellow in Canberra, who is retraining after an accident. To mention but 3.
They will get there because of the efforts of themselves and the facilitator.

Are the lesson plans good? Not particularly - how hard it is to plan for a phone hook up that can change direction the moment the student asnwers (and no, Kerrie, I am not making excuses.)

What has made most of my elearners successful?

The ability to reach them where they are at, to use the skills they have, to encourage them, to get back to them - even if the game of tag goes on for a week (sorry, Allen). Being adaptable, but above all else it is the responsiveness to facilitate someone who wants to learn.

To quote from John Connell's article...

‘Individual freedom realised in personal interdependence’ – what better way to describe the nature of the relationships we have to nurture in education today?

The quality of personal interdependence in learning now achievable on a global scale, through web technologies, is immeasurably greater than it was before. (from http://www.johnconnell.co.uk/blog/?p=2247 - There’s Good eLearning and there’s Bad eLearning: how do we tell one from the other? [Reprise] posted September 15,2009)
The complete article that is in the magazine can be downloaded at:
http://www.johnconnell.co.uk/files/elearning_jconnell.pdf

originally posted on WSI elf4us wiki as part of the eLF course on 7/11/2009

When Computers Leave Classrooms, So Does Boredom

When Computers Leave Classrooms, So Does Boredom
A comment that many teachers have/are losing their sting (so to speak)by relying on technology The Chronicle Article http://chronicle.com/article/Teach-Naked-Effort-Strips/47398/ explores this but now here they are trying to do this with some big courses.Whilst not strictly elearning, the item is worth a view. It has a video interview as well as the words.
It is an interesting thought in an era where technology is the thrust...

To Be an eLF

What is an eLF?
Well may you ask? (many famous people said this)


Well...today I started the eLearning Facilitator (eLF) course and thougt I would strt the thought process now before the first session's requirements are due.
Why would I do this after spending probably the last 7 years playing with technology to do deliver in different and interesting ways to people both in and away from the college?
Easy - I want the accreditation for the unit TAADEL501B (facilitate e-learning) from the TAA04 training package.
Secondly - I will learn something new, help more recent converts, and have fun

more to follow, as I do the reflective entries for the program (also to be copied onto the required WSI TAFE wikispace)

elf picture curtesy of TAFE WSI elf wiki

Workplace learning and the role of VET

Notes/observations on a conference

Rainbird

• learning in the workplace - a community of practice - not just an individual activity
• standards based (eg CBT) has the problem of not accessing the theoretical knowledge, how to learn-type skills
• should be focused on the learner

Cooney (Auto industry)

• short-term role of training
• so, must demonstrate return to business (in the now) - therefore job specific skills development

Effects -

• firm specific/job specific
• therefore, not necessarily transferable across the industry
• less focus on developmental learning

*** training not leading to the broad-based skill development that leads to innovation and product development

Giselle Mawer -SMEs

• experience and skills from on job (especially from supplier training) valued over accredited training
• accredited training for mandated requirements
• not much knowledge of the formal VET system, RPL and AQF qualifications (knowledge mainly from industry bodies - limited)
• individual needs training
• or for new pay structures

*** most of trainng undertaken was either free of direct costs or subsidised by govt and statewide subsidies and levies

*** employer responsible for employee currency

Barriers

• lack of relevance and unresponsive
• difficulties in releasing staff

Possible points of connection

• formal recognition of current skills (RPL)
• strategically targeted promotion and facilitation
• more integration of VET services with workplace business
• know industry context

Peter Waterhouse

• enterprise based not industry based training
• employers often don't place value on quals as much as employees
• quals - gateway at recruitment
• quals - and a developmental tool & career pathway

we all use the same ingredients - it is what you do with it that makesthe difference

• shift from delivery to dialogue on design of programs
• Training Package - instrument of policy and instrument of training
• contextualised & relevant does not mean reductionist or narrow.

Mary Jones (Indigenous programs - Victoria)

• need for program of critical thinking
• link of underpinning concepts to the competencies
• use of experiential learning (Kolb 1984)
• reflective learning
• group learning
• facilitated - group had ownership
• workplace did not always identify tacit knowledge
• use of learning journal
• workplace issues discussed in the formal learning place

• students linked to employers at start of program

also

• need to know the students
• program for welding - did not work because employers did not want to train - just get pre-skilled workers

Conclusion - John Bucannan

• ABS - most workers only have workplace training (WPT)
• WPT - being starved of resources
• - re-engage with on the job to hit training needs
• Problems with training sit with senior business and Government policy
• It is not RTOs being unresponsive but constrained to qualifications framework and Training packages
• Training packages - enterprises don't need full qualifications but skill sets.

"Looking for Blackfellas' Point"

I have just finished reading this book. It is a look at the history of place, a story that needed to be told about the history of what happened on the far south coast after the arrival of Europeans. It tells the history as it was - not as it was perceived. It places the history of the area into 4 parts: Dispossession, Forgetting, Abandonment, Confrontation.

The impact is enormous. It tells, using a lot of source material and oral histories, of the dispossession of the aboriginals from there land. It was a movement both open and by stealth. Then it moves into the realm of the way in which the whites conveniently "forgot" about the way in which they tried to wipe out the real locals. The interesting thing about the book is the way it deals with both sides. Part 3 looks at the how the non-Aboriginals felt about their circumstance - they largely had a sense of abandonment. They were at the frontier - a long way form what they saw as civilisation. There was almost no moral/ethical well being.

It wasn't till 30 years after settlement that there was any Christian Church that looked after the people.

And on some occasions the church didn't help the Aboriginal people.

And also, not every one was against the traditional locals. Chapter 6 is the story of Oswald Brierly, a young artist who came to the area with Ben Boyd to manage Boydtown. But he also came with paints, and pencils and made many observations. He tells the story of the locals: black and white. He has a strong empathy with the Aborigines, and often condemned the actions of the whites. "He was a pioneer of understanding rather than a pioneer of industry" (p 134)

Part 4 - Confrontation. (And it was)

Looks at the new history - the forgotten past - the real history. The pasted shaped now by the memory of what happened, about who we are (black and white). It is interesting that in 1967 Bega had the distinction of recording the 2nd highest rejection rate (voted no in the referendum for aboriginal equality). This section is challenging and very confronting as it reflects a lot about us all as a people (section 8 - "we are all one" p 162 ff). It reflects fear and discrimination, it shows heart and compassion.

Above all it showed a way forward. It tells of the move to reconciliation - of the need to be aware of and sensitive to the shame and pain of the white past.

Even though I (we) were not there does not meant that I/we can not have real regret about what happened in the past.

Even though the book is set about the south coast, it tells a story that is mostly true for all the country - there was good and bad everywhere.

It is now that we must understand and walk together. The past may be gone but the future beckons...

One amazing book - well done Mark McKenna.

Book details: Looking for Blackfellas' Point: an Australian History of Place, Mark McKenna , 9780868406442, UNSW Press, August 2002

I came across this interesting link.
It is the blog site for a Sydney Uni History unit about Land, Memory and Place in History (It will probably vanish after the end of semester which will be a shame). Yep it has a new link: http://blogs.usyd.edu.au/writingplace/2007/04/the_relationship_between_place.html (as at 7/3/2008)