My final blog post

This has been a fun and useful exercise.  It was good to use a tool other than webtycho for an assignment.  I've never created a blog before.  I've never even partipated in reading another person's blog.  I like the fact that I can go back and see a reflective journal of sorts of my experience with this class.  This would be a good way to keep a record of what I learned in all of my classes.  

One challenge with this though...I was never able to figure out how to respond to a person's comment on my blog.  The help tool wasn't very useful to me for this topic.

It's been a great experience.   Thanks Dave for all of your comments and questions. 

Signing off,

Robin

Still can't figure out how to respond to a comment - back to Dave

Robin,

I'm also taking ISD I but with UMBC as a part of a ISD/E-Learning Joint Certificate program with UMUC as my home school. Do you find that taking these course together help you with your studies? I actually enjoy the classes together because they are similar yet different. DE teaching the process of putting content online with ISD instructions you how to develop good course content using the ADDIE Model.

Dave

Dave,

I agree that taking these two classes together was a good thing to do.  It's good how Moore & Kearsley's chapter five came at the best time since this is where I am in my instructional design for the class I have to create as part of my instructional design class.

Thanks for your questions.

Best,

Robin

The dreaded group project

I understand why it's important to have interaction with your classmates, but group projects are usually challenging for me as a student.  In my undergrad at UMUC, I had many instances where the group project went poorly.  This was primarily due to students having competing priorities and poor communication. 

My first group project in MDE last semester went surprisingly well.  The group wiki project for this class was interesting in that this is the first group project that I had that didn't utilize the group project module in Webtycho.  I was challenged in the beginning not having the ability to communicate with my fellow group members via the group project conference.  Some of the emails in our class member roster don't appear to be the primary email for some of the members.   This created a challenge because there was a time lag in responses.  Once we got the emails straightened out, communciation became easier. 

If I had to give any feedback on this assignment, it would be to allow the group to communicate within the webtycho group project conference.  This is a better record of what transpired between the group members.   If there is an issue with someone not participating, it would become clear using this tool.

Instructional Designing - Happy to have some principals and some tips

I am taking two classes this summer.  This class and DETT607 - Instructional Design.  I found Chapter Five in Moore and Kearsley to have a lot of good recommendations and theories of how a DE class should be designed.  In this class I have to learn the process of instructional design and I have to apply it by creating a class using webtycho.  We have gone through the needs assessment and context analysis and just completed defining the learning objectives.  It is now time to develop the course.  There are many authoring tools that I can choose from.  Since I've never designed a course before, it's seems a little overwhelming on what tools I should choose from.  Moore and Kearsley have added some beneficial principals to apply to the text design and what types of tools could be applied to form my class.  I learned a lot of good information that I can apply to my other class. 

Best,

Robin

Reply to Dave's question

Hi Dave,

I tried to comment on your comment to my last post, but I can't seem to get it to work correctly.   At any rate, here is my response to Dave:

Hi Dave,
I think the most difficult part of the assignment was being able to distinguish between synchronous and asynchrounous use for my softwares that I was exploring. 
I prefer asynchronous communication for the same reason that you do - flexibility.  When I am working on group projects, I like to communicate synchronously so that all of the members are on the same page at the same time.
Thanks for your comments/questions.
Robin

Assignment One - Done

I submitted Assignment One today.  I was able to understand a need for delivery of education as a hybrid solution with both synchronous and asynchronous opportunities.  For these students who need to be a part of a classroom or community, sychronous communication will be an integral part of the process.  For those who manage to a schedule, asynchronous communication gives them the opportunity to have the tools of the class available on demand. 

Assignment One - Project Update

Monday, July 4, 2011.  I completed my first draft for Assignment One.  I reviewed WebEx as a synchronous demo and Desire2Learn as an asynchronous demo.  One of the benefits of using WebEx is that according to Pullen and Snow, regular synchronous meetings result in fewer delayed completion and a reduced drop out rate.  If these meetings were mandatory, I would be more engaged in my class.  One of the potential pitfals by using synchronous meetings is that is could conflict with students' schedules.  WebEx has a record a meeting feature that could be used.  This would give those students who attend the meetings, notes of the meeting and those who couldn't attend could view the meeting when their schedule allows.