Engaging parents in E-learning.

Thinking about e-learning, one question that comes up to my mind is: What would take place of the so called Parents’ days if we implement an e-learning system? In the present education system, we have the students going to schools and the teachers keeping up-to-date records about them. These records are then shown to parents on parents’ day to know what progress their children are making and where they have to improve.

Can the parents know this if the students get involved in an e-learning system? In my opinion, yes there have to be some kind of parental involvement in the e-learning system that would be implemented. One example of engaging parents into e-learning might be the involvement of e-portfolios where the students upload their work. These e-portfolios would be used for the parents to know their students’ progress and also to be able to comment and give feedback on their children’s progress which might be of a great benefit to their children as they would be able to know what their parents think about their work. The advantage behind this is that this system might become a social experience where the parents are able to discuss education with their children. They would be able to ask questions, understand, praise and give feedback to their own children.

However, the problem is that parents are not really good at giving feedback when it comes to their own children because they tend to praise them too much or conversely they would be too critical about their children. Both of which situations do not help the process to improve learning. On the other hand there might be some parents who do not contribute at all. The reasons behind this might be that parents do not have time to view their children’s work online, or even that the parents do not know how to use a computer on their own. Due to this most of the parents would have to view the portfolio together with their child where the child would act as a teacher leading the parent to the e-portfolio. Following this one would probably find that parents of older students would not give too much feedback or none at all, as we all know that at a certain age the relationship between parents and students tend to be in a disappointing situation!

This is the only method of parental involvement that came up to my mind so far. Do you have any other ideas? If you do, please do share.

SCORM capabilities and advantages

SCORM is a collection of specifications taken from various sources so that e-learning can take place with the following in mind: interoperability, reusability and accessible Web-based content. Indeed, SCORM-compliant learning object is a collection of resources which is described by metdata, organized as one or more learning objects (aka SCO), and is intended to be delivered to the learner via a Web-browser.

SCORM-compliant LMS system accepts any SCORM-compliant content and make it available to the LMSs’ users. This system delivers and launches the content to the learner in the provided run-time environment which must meet certain requirements defined by the SCORM specification and conformance requirement document. The content which is delivered to the learner is launched in a web browser window.

It is possible to have a SCORM implementation without the use of an internet or a network but a closed intranet will also be fine.

Some advantages of SCORM are that once you published it, it can be accessed very easily everywhere you want, thus content life is longer. Content is difficult to become obsolete since it is easier to justify ongoing compatibility with standard content. Also, you do not need to worry about technical incompatibilities, but you are free to get pieces of information from here and there and mix the content as you wish.

I suggest that you visit this site http://www.sumtotalsystems.com/resources/toolbook/community_scorm.html as it helped me a lot to further understand SCORM and all its stuff.

The future of E-Learning

In broad terms, one can say that education and technology are intertwined together where ones educational experience is constantly being enhanced and improved through the use of technology. Nowadays, it is commonly said that in the near future, every person will experience the need to learn how to use technology in order to improve his/her education. In the meantime, those left out from such technological transition are in a risk of experiencing alienation and isolation from the rest of the society. These people very often feel left out and are labeled as the ‘non technological’ people.

Admit or not, the internet has contributed in making the acquiring of new knowledge quicker and vast. Never-ending volumes of information and knowledge are just a click away. Now, every student has the ability to roam around on the internet and benefit from by increasing and stimulating more his creativity.

Moreover, the idea to emerge e-learning with the training portfolio is becoming increasingly popular. Nowadays e-learning has become accepted as an effective educational tool within the schools. Adding to this, it is believed that in the near future, new approaches will be used as well such as wireless and 3G which will make the flexibility aspect more possible. Thus, it is up to each teacher and educational instructor to learn how and when to use this new phenomenon and facility to its best advantage. The main aim is to initiate students’ motivation and make them feel engrossed in the educational experience.

How reliable is the content presented on the internet? Standards were set with the prime intention so as to ensure that all data on the web is described in the correct way and gives the relevant useful information that is useful to the user. Otherwise the whole concept of the semantic web becomes irrelevant. Pre-set standards are fundamentally important so as to guarantee that the information presented on the internet is compliant and follows all the required specifications and requirements.

If these standards are respected and overhauled, quality of data is enriched and thus e-learning will be even more encouraged to be incorporated within the organizations and schools.

Significant indications show that as more people are getting connected online, the internet will get further infiltrated into one’s life. As a consequence this will result in a greater need to incorporate education over the internet. The fact that e-learning is getting cheaper to implement and more technology platforms and tools are becoming accessible, all this promotes more the realization of social learning.

References and further relevant readings:

E-learning is future? www.le-learning.in. Accessed from: http://www.e-learning.in/e-learning-is-future.html

Spender, D. (2002). E-Learning and its future. Global Summit 2002. Accessed from: http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/APCITY/UNPAN007782.pdf

The future of e-learning is social learning. Accessed from: http://www.slideshare.net/janehart/the-future-of-elearning-is-social-learnng

learning in the 21st Century

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L2XwWq4_BY&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJYpsB3o0Uc&feature=related

These 2 videos caught my attention as they were amongst the videos which came up after searching for elearning clips on YouTube. They mainly emphasize the need of a shift in our teaching in the 21^st century, where everything seems to revolve more around the technology we are surround with in this era. In fact in Dr.James H.Billington’s foreword he mentions how technology is changing the way students learn. Although elearning is not specifically mentioned as a tool, one can see the criteria mentioned to teach in a 21^st century mentioned through these 2 videos, are very much similar to the possibilities elearning gives to a learner. There are 3 important questions which we need to ask when we come to learning in the 21^st century:

1. What are the essential skills and knowledge?
2. How do we create powerful learning for all students to ensure they get the skills and knowledge they need in this technology based world?
3. What kind of learning organisations do we need for such education to occur?

Having thought about these questions, I can see elearning as one of the learning organisations which can provide the multiple ways of delivering learning which Randy DeHoff speaks about in the clip. This is because through elearning we as teachers can organise content which comprises not only of static displays of text but can also include multimedia content. Having said this, such content can create powerful learning opportunities to all students, engaging different abilities within the different students.

In the Library of congress clip, it is mentioned that our students need to develop complex skills to be successful in today’s society. One of such skills is the ability for the students to direct their own learning and ability to critically think to be able to use the information available in an efficient manner. Such an environment can be set through an elearning platform, where the student is presented with a library of all types and formats of information designed by the teacher, to make the best use of it in a way that the student is not only learning the content but also developing such skills.

“In the 21^st century each of us must be a learner and a teacher”

I think this is one of the most important phrases told during the clip as it shows the importance that everyone is ready to share knowledge and everyone has the right to access and learn from the knowledge shared. From what I’ve understood about elearning, I believe this is one, if not the main, fundamental concept of elearning; where everyone creates learning objects which are shared. The idea of a learning object which according to IEEE a Learning object is an entity, digital or non digital that can be used, reused again or invite during the learning process (IEEE – LOM,2002).

Keeping in mind this scenario, where everyone can create small chunks of content knowledge, known as learning objects, and share them through an online platform, a particular issue arises:

How can I be sure that the learning object is reliable?

What is the basic skeleton of a learning object?

What does it have to contain and what doesn’t have to contain?

The creation of learning object standards helps give guidelines to every person who can contribute on an elearning platform when organising learning object. Upon researching on learning object standards, I realised there are several standards to make sure that the learning objects produced are useful.

I found an interesting paper online which has some very interesting information about elearning standards :

http://www.cdac.in/html/pdf/Session6.1.pdf

This covers the need needs and issues of an elearning infrastructure; it also outlines the needs for standards and which major companies work to set such standards.

I think the one thing which really worries me, so to speak, is how ready are people to take the work in creating learning objects, and put them online for all to use? I think not everyone feels at ease having his/her work being completely shareable. I believe this is one of the main hurdles we may find in the implementation of elearning systems, especially from what I hear and see here in Malta’s educational system.

A SCORM course

As we all know, SCORM is a standard for online learning.

Communication is very important in teaching. We all encourage students to discuss any problems they encounter. If the students do not tell their teacher about a difficulty, s/he might assume that all students understood the topic/ lesson very well when the story might be all different. That is why communication and keeping track of the students’ progress is important.

A SCORM course is equivalent to a good teacher. A SCORM course has its lesson plans, knows its students, knows the names of the students, tracks students’ progress, tracks what a particular student studied, what has been revised and even the students’ marks – whether a pass or a fail has been obtained.

Therefore, a SCORM course is the same as a teacher since all the activities that are carried out by a teacher are carried out by it. Moreover, this type of course can make sure that to start lesson 2, lesson 1 has to be understood.
An advantage of SCORM is that the learner has freedom on how to use it. Moreover, the content can be shared with others and the students/ learners can be at any school.

In my opinion, a SCORM course is like a ‘digital’ teacher. Both the teacher and the learner benefit from it.

For further detail:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzxNwWvmwf4

Digital learners

Attention is an important element in learning; if students’ attention is not gained, effective learning will never occur. We as 21^st century teachers should seek for technological resources and educational tools which engage students in their learning, thus students pay more attention.

This video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egRVc3R1u1U helped to intensely reflect upon very important issues that we as teachers are facing and will continue to face in our future teaching careers. We need to take into consideration how students learn therefore their learning styles. We have the responsibility to facilitate their learning through pleasant and enjoyable experiences and ultimately address their learning needs.

21^st century students are known as digital learners wherein in their personal lives they use technology frequently. Because of this technological phenomenon we need to create effective technological learning environments. Being Computing teachers we may take it for granted that our subjects on their own use technology but we still have to integrate technological resources in our subjects’ curriculum to fully gain students’ attention and participation since nowadays technology is an indispensable aspect in their lives. We have to reach our students through this technological aspect to entirely engage them in their learning experiences.

The WWW has a lot of effective potentials which can be exploited educationally by teachers. Through internet, teachers can dynamically teach, engage and reach students. There exist various web tools which can be integrated in teaching and learning such as wikis, blogs, games, forums, webquests, podcasts, e-portofolios, virtual worlds etc.

As the video illustrates, we should engage students enthusiastically in their learning rather than upset and annoy them through traditional teaching and learning. Thus e-learning systems would be the best solution to attract students where mostly all web tools can be incorporated in this environment and used actively by all students outside school premises. E-learning systems connect not only students’ altogether but also teachers, parents and other stakeholders. Hence building up communities where they can share ideas, information and even opportunities at a distance through technological means.

E-learning in Malta

On Thursday, 29^th July 2010, while having a look at the online version of the Maltese newspaper Times of Malta, I came across an article named: “E-learning: It’s all about the students, teachers and parents.” Since I am interested in reading about computing and since my dissertation concerns E-learning, this article kept me reading.

Basically, the article was about two local non-governmental schools which have adopted an e-learning system by having their own e-learning platform. The two schools mentioned were the Chiswick House School and St. Martin’s College, in both of which the students have took on the e-learning system.

The principal of the two schools, Patrick Tabone, explained that when choosing an e-learning platform one has to make sure that it offers personalized learning where the work is usually project-based. The students need also to be able to develop their communication with others together as well as their teamwork skills, apart from their creativity. It is also important that the platform is reachable from both teachers and students in a comfortable manner where communication methods such as forums are available. Even the sharing of materials (such as documents, images and videos) between teachers and students must be available and easy to do.

However, the need of this kind of technology is not yet seen to be adequate for Maltese state schools as the Maltese government has still not decided about including it in the educational system even though it was explained that e-learning will substitute schools. The only instance where e-learning was introduced in Malta before these two independent schools was for higher education. Could it be that the Maltese are afraid of this system? Could it be that they have the wrong perception of e-learning? Quite a large number of people believe that e-learning means that schools will be completely abolished.

“International experience clearly shows that no e-learning platform can, or should try to be, a substitute for face-to-face teaching and learning, but it can be an excellent complementary tool. Since the online world will certainly be an important fact of our students’ future life, a closed, monitored, online community such as the one we are creating is also a safe way for our students to learn how to navigate the net safely.” (Tabone, 2010)

The idea behind e-learning is to start a learning process adequate and available for everyone. This system has to be started discreetly and its usage can be increased according to the comfort and adaptation of those using it. As Tabone said, the platform can also be monitored, through portfolios and tracking systems to make sure that the students are safe while they can access their information easily. Due to this, students would have to access their profiles through personalized logins and so they are kept safe while they are learning more effectively. Apart from that, an e-learning system makes it easier to develop communication with parents as they can be engaged in the system and so are able to check out on their children.

“We believe that Malta can become the hub of e-learning excellence that will empower and accelerate the development of Malta as a knowledge economy,” (Francois Grech, executive director at Exigy).

You can read the full article by following this link:

http://www.timesofmalta.com/technology/view/20100729/news/e-learning-it-s-all-about-the-students-teachers-and-parents

Learning to Change & Changing to Learn

Whether we accept it or not, nowadays we are being faced with the fundamental need to promote change within the educational system. The aim behind such change is to cater for a more enhanced learning.

“Kids are very rich content developers to learn to such social networking sites. They are big communicators to email, instant messaging and text messaging and yet all of those things are banned from their schools.”
Julie Evans (CEO, Project Tomorrow)

Technology has started reshaping education causing a transformational change within the traditional classroom based setting. Interactive digital content is gaining more emphasises as it boasts with its on demand learning, interactivity, learner-centeredness and personalization whereby with the phenomenon of e-learning the learning path and pace are determined by the learner. This contrasts with the synchronous one learning path as offered in the traditional classroom. On the other hand the traditional classroom style teaching will not necessarily be eliminated but it will decrease in its emphasis for sure.


One of the outstanding benefits of e-learning is flexibility as it is based on standardized modular packages where anyone can make use of these modules. Daniel Pink (Author “A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future) mentions the importance of applying standards in order to make things better.
Furthermore, as stated in the video by Stephen Heppell (CEO, Heppell.Net Ltd., UK), the new emerging technology creates a more harmonious space whereby the learners can benefit from a more media-rich content. E-learning is convenient (being self-paced and flexible), cost-effective, consistent by promoting the same quality of education for all, repeatable and more precise. Thus, learning can also be done through and online community. As stated by Karen Greenwood Henke (Write and Consultant, CoSN Board Member, Nimble Press), “…we got a classroom society where it could be a community one…”.


Susan Patrick (CEO, NACOL: North American Council for Online Learning) further comments that “its about providing the best quality teachers no matter where the teacher lives and making those bridges…”. It is in the teacher’s obligation to use all available technology and encourage collaborative learning. This can be done by bridging and incorporating the ‘old’ with the ‘new’ changes.

To conclude, using the Professor’s Zhao own words:

“We have to accept as educators that technology is not an inner choice it has created a world… it has invented.. it has emerged into the new environment. “
Yong Zhao (University Distinguished Professor and Executive Director, Confucius Institute, College of Education, Michigan State University)

References:

Learning to Change Changing to Learn Advancing K-12 Technology Leadership, Consortium for School Networking(COSN) Video. Accessed from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tahTKdEUAPk&p=AE24A679B107EE03&index=27&feature=BF

E-learning for Education: Multimedia University. Accessed from: http://www.authorstream.com/Presentation/Willi-53569-Learning-Education-Truth-business-going-big-Market-Internet-Users-conti-e-for-ppt-powerpoint/

Elearning in our Secondary schools

One of the main things which really struck me and made me think a lot after our first week’s lecture was how Ken Robinson managed to focus on an instinctive human desire and connect it to a way of teaching. It sounds so obvious to us that we do best at the things we love, and it comes very natural to us since we enjoy putting energy and passion in what we love. Yet it rarely might rarely cross our finds, that the students we have, are in search of things to enjoy, especially at an age where they are still quite young and want to explore more. We can offer those instances where they can enjoy what they do and develop a desire to learn and know more through their enthusiasm about what they love doing.

In my opinion, there are various ways how to capture the students’ enthusiasm and link it with educational stuff. Two particular tools which I find may be very useful are:

1. Gaming in education - as this provides fun and generally the right gaming environment appeals to people of different ages especially to young and adolescent ones

2. Elearning which should be designed in a manner to provide a personalised way of self learning. This can be very useful as one finds different tasks requiring different abilities, from which the user can choose to try and learn according to his/her skills and the pace he/she wishes to move with. This personalisation in education gives space to providing instances where the learner can learn in accordance to what he/she loves doing and what he/she prefers.

So I think, using elearning as a tool in our schools might be very useful and helpful to the students. To be honest I can’t imagine using solely elearning to teach, our secondary school students at this point in time, however I think it could be used as an additional tool which can be used to instigate our students’ desire to learn more by designing the topics in a way which attracts the students’ interests. This I believe can be done as elearning is quite a flexible teaching tool where the same concept can be presented in different activities on the same platform and is accessible to all to explore. This variety and accessibility to all can be very useful to teach our secondary students, especially now with the new college system.

I think as teachers of this new system it can be a bit difficult at times to make sure that every student, with his/her own ability is being catered for with the explanation and exercises given in class. Through elearning we as teachers can design different activities which require different abilities , those requiring low abilities to those requiring higher abilities, which students can try out and work one activity after the other, thus scaffolding learning. Having said this, elearning provides self paced learning, thus if a student is a slow learner, one can take his/her time to grasp the concept through activities; whilst one who is a quick learner is not held down from aspiring to know more about a concept; thus it may avoid any sense of uneasiness or discomfort for our students.

I think the main obstacle at this point is, how are we going to introduce and implement effectively this elearning system in our profession, so that the advantages which come with elearning, are exploited.

Learning communities: how do these sustain learning?

The concept of learning community was emerged from the time of Plato and later by Dewey. In learning community there is a shift in learning from that on focusing to individual to community.

With the advancement of technology, ICT made it possible for the advance of learning community in the form of online learning community. Learning community facilitate learning in that it does not only enhance the sharing of knowledge but also in creating new one which can be used for the benefit to the community and to the individual members (Kilpatric, Barrett & Jones, n.d.)

Gabelnick, MacGregor, Matthews and Smith (1990) as cited in Kilpatrick et al. (n.d.) defined learning community in an educational perspective as:

A learning community is any one of a variety of curricular structures that link together several existing courses—or actually restructure the curricular material entirely—so that students have opportunities for deeper understanding of and integration of the material they are learning, and more interaction with one another and their teachers as fellow participants in the learning enterprise.

Among the benefits of learning community mentioned in this paper Kilpatrick et al. (n.d.) there are the benefit of professional development, sharing of knowledge, sense of inquiry and communication. But as mentioned, in order to achieve the full benefit, it is important to have a level of trust and characteristics of a good team amongst the members of the learning community.

Reference:
Kilpatrick, S., Barrett, M., & Jones, T. (n.d.). Defining Learning Communities. Retrieved October 17, 2010 from http://www.aare.edu.au/03pap/jon03441.pdf

The Shift in World Wide Web through the years!

Earlier World Wide Web (Web 1.0), had static web pages with no web design. It was a read-only material presented by those who put it on the web. The world wide web was simply made up of a number of websites which were indexed by search engines, such as Google. Internet connections were slower and this contributed a lot in the restrictions of the internet.

The refinement of these factors was the onset of the Web 2.0 which now has broadband, browsers and Flash applications, as well as the use of widgets. All this was a result of the change in the people using the World Wide Web who are no longer computer illiterate. Website content is now generated by the internet users themselves. Apart from that, web pages in Web 2.0 are more dynamic and one can use blogs, wikis and social networks, as well as podcasts, video calling and conferencing, collaborative catalogues of movie files, information and audio, and also RSS feeds. Apart from that the internet user can also: put up comments on images and statuses in social networks (such as on Facebook) or even edit the content on a wiki, developing a read-write web.

This makes it obvious that these web applications are facilitating the sharing of information and collaboration since it is becoming user-centred and this is all due to using network protocols and plug-ins to handle the new types of contents that are being put up on the web. This shift has already changed a lot the idea that people had about world wide web, as while earlier it was just a source of information, nowadays it has become a way to connect with others as well as a personal live portfolio since users can have as many accounts with as many applications as he or she likes. It can also be seen clearly that the more it goes, the internet is becoming more efficient to search for information, to communicate, to work, and also to use while having some free time.

Following this, one might have already heard about the Web 3.0. In fact, there are already plans in more improvements to be added to the current Web 2.0 to form up the Web 3.0 that will probably be used in the next few years. In fact I have found this particular website in which one can read more about the Web 3.0 in comparison with the Web 2.0: http://www.suite101.com/content/what-is-web-30-a61407

Tips on delivering an engaging Virtual Classroom presentation

Different software platforms have different options and functionalities. It is important that in virtual classrooms interaction and participation is encouraged. Although a virtual class reduces cost and traveling, it is important that platforms are used in the right way. It means that it should not be used just to decorate. Since there is no face to face contact, the instructor would not know whether the learners are sending messages or chatting instead of paying attention.

The first thing that should be done is delete the idea from our minds that a virtual class is just a reproduction of a traditional class. If this is so, it would be useless. In my opinion, that is why many teachers have a misconception about virtual learning. It is not just uploading the information from papers on to the internet. It is more than this. That is why many teachers find this new technology un useful.

Planning is very important. The interactions should be well planned. Types of interactions:
1.With other participants – in my opinion, the learners can learn a lot from this type of interaction since they are communicating with others and therefore learning from each other.
2.With the instructor – the best way in which the learner can know where s/he stands.
3.With the platform itself.

When the learner plans the interactions, the learning objectives must be well known. In this way, the learner would know whether the objectives and aims have been reached. Moreover, the learner’s attention must be present at all times.

The different software platforms help in interactions such as visuals, chat rooms, break out rooms, polling and whiteboard. Therefore to have successful learning by the learners, effective platforms have to be used.

For more detail:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxY22IhbaH4&feature=related

Metadata for better teaching and access to multi-media resources!!

How can you get your information to the right audience? What can make web search more meaningful? Metadata is the right option! It will give a precise description for your resource (book, web pages, audio/video material etc).

Do you know that we use metadata everyday?! Searching for the nutritional information of a product at a supermarket…that metadata!

On the web, we can make use of different types of meta data:
- Descriptive metadata: subject, form and creators of the resource
- Administrative metadata: who owns that resource and who has the right to keep it
- Technical metadata: how this resources is stored, and the system specifications needed to access that resource
- Rights metadata: legal rights on that resource

Metamedia gives the opportunity for students and teachers to share media-rich resources. These can be subject-specific, thus one can further incorporate multimedia resources to make teaching more interesting. Indeed, when such multi-media resources are utilised, students can shape better their interpretations and may get a deeper understanding of complex concepts

MetaMedia framework, wants to ensure that that everything will be interoperable with other current and also future media resources with other Educational Technology Systems. Thus, Metadata Services Unit is doing a metadata implementation for this framework to best create and use metadata.

Follow this link, to get an idea of this framework. You can also find projects that already used this framework: http://metaphor.mit.edu/projects.html

E-Learning Standards

Standards in E-learning are of utmost importance since they guide organizations to produce effective and robust e-learning environments. According to S. C. Babu (n.d), “Standards impose certain order providing more uniform and precise access and manipulation to e-Learning resources and data.” Thus such standards guarantee consistency in e-Learning systems. Various standards were developed to assist people in designing and creating e-learning content and environments.

As we have discussed in class, ISO (International Standard Organization) is a standard association that acknowledges and approves standards that are of de jure type. Until now, ISO has more than 18,000 standards. The main purpose of ISO is to unite the different techniques to develop e-learning systems. B. Peoples (2006), ISO chairman stated that “The standard represents the harmonized international know-how on quality for e-learning.”

Among the various standards accredited by ISO, I came across a very interesting standard which was certified in 2008: ISO/IEC 24751:2008, Information technology – Individualized adaptability and accessibility in e-learning, education and training. This standard seeks to cater for learners who have any type of disability by providing effective learning experience in e-learning environments. In this standard, disability does not only imply physical inabilities but also include inappropriate and inadequate environments (disruptive environments), unavailable resources (webcam, speakers, special keyboards, Braille monitors) and poor knowledge. Through this standard, all learners can use e-learning efficiently as their needs have been catered and satisfied.

Advantages and disadvantages of using e-Learning and online instruction with students

E-learning is a form of online training where individualized tutoring can be offered. E-learning caters for different learning needs and styles. It must attract students’ attention through interactivity, attractive resources and feedback given by teachers.

In my opinion, students will easy get familiar with such new learning system since today’s young people use technology continuously in their personal lives for entertainment and even for education. Marc Prensky labeled these young technological people as digital natives. In the near future, I am sure we will use e-learning or any type of online instruction in our teaching career. Incorporating this new learning system will sure have a large impact in our teaching and students’ learning. There will be negative and positive impacts:

Advantages of e-learning:

· Students can follow and complete topics assigned at any time;

· Students with different learning styles can fully benefit from this system since they can learn at their own pace and use appropriate resources available that meet their learning needs;

· Various resources, activities and tasks will be available in e-learning which will facilitate students learning, being auditory, visual or kinesthetic learner.

· Using such system, students will have to use online communication services such as chat, e-mail, etc as an educational tool. Thus they may develop positive attitudes towards e-learning;

· Students will acquire more ICT skills;

· Some students will become more independent in their own learning;

Disadvantages of e-learning:

· Class interaction and face-to-face communication are important elements in teaching;

· Some students may learn better in a physical environment rather on a virtual one;

· Not all students may have ICT skills or technological resources to learn online;

· Some students may express themselves better in a face-to-face communication;

Personally, the greatest challenge that I can see related to the adoption of e-learning systems in Maltese schools is that of engaging other teachers in this new system. This new change in teaching and learning may not be positively accepted by all teachers. Thus negative attitude may be developed towards e-learning which will lead to less collaboration between teachers. Other stakeholders such as parents and school administration may not be in favor of implementing this new learning system and therefore teachers do not find any support and help if needed. Workload issues also arise; designing and implementing e-learning content may need a lot of time, thus being time-consuming for us teachers.

E-learning Versus Traditional Teaching

The internet has taken the world by storm and as a result we are nowadays living in a technological society whereby online learning has become accessible to people internationally. This leads us to question the relevance of the traditional classroom based teaching in such a modern world. However does necessarily e-learning initiates the removal of textbooks, other reference books, schools and even the teachers?

It is important to note that whatever the type of education the child will undergo, teaching after all is a matter of creating a healthy learning environment where all students can engage themselves regardless of the advanced resources which we are nowadays being faced with. Thus, the key issue relies in the concept of trying to cater for all students.

I personally think that the best way to handle this issue would be to adapt our teaching strategies according to the classroom we are teaching. I think that our teaching should be in relation to our students' potentiality. If we are faced with students who possess all the necessary technological equipment, then I tend to strongly agree in introducing this phenomena of e-learning. On the other hand, if the students lack the equipment to benefit from e-learning, I would have to resort back to the traditional teaching tools and resources. Otherwise we would be discriminating learning to these students. Yet, one cannot but mention the fact that if we blindly decide to keep e-learning at a distance from our teaching strategies, certain students might experience de-motivation. And indeed we cannot blame them as nowadays society is constantly increasing the expectations of experiencing the education process in a most interactive manner. Being faced with such dilemma, I am inclined to believe that we cannot simply draw a line and decide to adopt a fixed teaching strategy. Furthermore, my ideal would be if the teacher manages to promote an education whereby learning is intertwined with the use of the web and physical contact.

One cannot but forget to mention that human interaction is fundamental for the students in order to develop their social skills. At the same time the use of technologies such as e-learning will help us teachers to make learning more fun and interactive. I think that given the chance to make use of it, I would gladly try to introduce and put this phenomenon into practice.

Are we delivering Education as a "fast food" concept?

The question that I want to analyse in this post is: "Are we delivering Education as a "fast food" concept, rather than as a personalized experience for the individuals who, we are indeed, responsible for?".

When cooking “fast food” meals, there are general recipes which one need to follow in order to cook that particular meal. In my opinion, we are following this type of rhythm. As in “fast food” one has to follow recipes, teachers are also given these “recipe” which in this case it is the syllabus. Teachers are sort of ‘forced’ by stakeholders to follow it in order to prepare students at the end of the scholastic year to the exams and at the end of the secondary school to the Matsec exams.

From this point of view, we are delivering Education as a “fast food”. One has to question, what happen when you teach students who are in Form 4 Mathematics and they do not know basic functions and principles of mathematics. How can we teach them advance level when they do not have the basic level?

Today, we are moving away from steaming to mixed ability classes. Are teachers catering for all students or because of restricted time we are not? I think teachers are facing a lot of dilemmas. I believe that the first think that we need to accept is that although we are teachers we do not know everything and I think that training is required in order to help us to adapt and believe in the new educational tools.

Here I recall what an LSA told me during my teaching practice. She told me that her student followed easier in my lesson because during explanation I used presentation. Even his mother explained to her that if teachers used visual graphics in order to explain things it would be easier to her son to improve learning. But the LSA commented that not all teachers were willing to spend more time to do presentations. Thus although there are new tools which could help this student and other like him, still teachers because of some reasons are not willing to use these new tools.

I think that we all agree that teachers are responsible for students’ learning and we should help students to engage in learning and to encourage them to learn. But I think that there are a lot of issues to solve in order to move away from the “fast food” concept not only from the teachers’ end but also from the students’ end and from the education division end.

E-learning in the eyes of the students

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_A-ZVCjfWf8&feature=related

Here, I posted a link about a students that state what they do during their days We can see that technology plays a big part. Teachers can take this hints given by these children to use technology as a tool for students to develop skills.

Apart from teachers understand what are the ways children might enjoy learning, this video should inspire the stakeholders to provide teachers with the tools and training to be able to perform this new ways of teaching. We can Engage the students more with technology.

P.S This link is also very good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nkhkMWzc3c&feature=related

Are education stakeholders prepared for e-learning?

As educators we all know that change in the Education system is coming. Right now a lot of issues is being discussed and planned, aiming for a better education for all. But when it comes to discuss the introduction of e-learning in our schools, I ask “Are we prepared for this?”

Adapting e-learning in our education system by means of technology (and not just having access to the Web 2.0 tools like many say) require loads of preparation by the education stakeholders, mainly by teachers and Head of schools. Indeed, careful training and support must take place, both pedagogically and technically.

The installation of interactive whiteboards did not change anything in certain schools since the potential benefit of interactivity is not taken by just projecting slides using this technology. It’s true that teachers need to invest more time to prepare a one-hour lesson, but it has several advantages. Preparation for a lesson is only a one-time occurrence since repetition of the same lesson should require no extra preparation if planned carefully beforehand. Another requisite is that e-learning asks for sharing resources among us teachers, but unfortunately there are people who still are afraid of sharing their work on-line or giving it to their colleagues. Technophobic teachers may feel that this e-learning phenomenon may ruin their pedagogy they are used to, because indeed they do not understand that new pedagogies need to be introduced for teaching 21^st century learners. Students live in a digitized world, they are equipped with technology everywhere they go…is everyone realizing this before we just introduce e-learning? I believe that teachers need more to be acquainted to the teaching experience by this method.

In conclusion for today’s note, I feel that for achieving pedagogical advantages with e-learning such as active learning and immediate feedback, teachers must do advance preparation. With fairly some disadvantages, technology allows the use of multimedia (sound, simulation, video and animated text) for creative teaching, further motivation, effective feedback and enhanced learning. Thus, we must be creative in our teaching as Sir Ken Robinson states that “My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status.”

Comparing different strategies

A US-based research report has revealed that even though students participating in online courses seem to score at a higher level than when students follow the same course in a traditional setting the report raises a number of questions, such as...can we really compare online courses to traditional? What if for the online course you have an excellent instructor, whereas the traditional course is taught in a mediocre way? What if you have an excellent tutor carrying out face-to-face lectures?
In a way this report brings out the true value of pedagogy... what the teacher/tutor/educator manages to elicit from the students is rather in my opinion irreplaceable but on the other hand, the same teacher has to face the future and adapt accordingly. A nice quote caught my eye, by J. Catone (2009): "Anyone can absorb information from a book or video, but good teachers will always be necessary to draw out that knowledge and help students develop the skills needed to think critically about the information they consume. In other words, online learning tools are just like any other tools in a teacher’s bag of tricks: what matters is how they’re applied."
We are indeed part of the answer to the education of the future... it all depends on the direction we take with our students.
I would suggest we put ourselves in perspective and try to see how our actions may indeed affect the people we have in front of us... as the authors of "Spiderman" rightly pointed out :)) ... "With great power, comes great responsibility", and as Educators, I think we can fairly say that we have great influencing power on many of our young followers within the classroom.

E-learning

Computer/ Internet use is changing. Where beforehand it was considered as a single function device like searching for information, nowadays it is being considered as a multi function device. Some of the activities are paying bills online, chat, communicate and more. This has been a great change and for some people including myself it is phenomenal. Example physically impaired people can easily pay bills. Personally, it did change my usage. Overtime, it is like the Web is changing according to my needs and not vice versa.

As regards to education, there is also a change. Many teachers upload notes and presentations however in my opinion, there are some teachers who are still ‘frightened’ or still ‘green’ to use this technology. It may also be hard to convince the elder teachers who have been teaching for a very long time by making use of paper.

I think that the concept of ‘distance learning’ is still new to some people. When thinking of it, it sounds great since there are both advantages and disadvantages. The first thing that comes to my mind to describe this concept is learning without any interaction with other people. Although there might be a tutor/ other students learning, there is no physical contact. If any problems are encountered, the tutor’s response may take some days as well.

When learning without any interaction with other people, the interaction becomes a Web-based one. In fact in this type of learning the only problem I would find is solitude. Personally, having other people to whom I can talk (face to face) gives me more courage and enthusiasm.
E-learning inside a classroom can accommodate students in many ways. If a student is sick, the lesson can be still delivered at home. The student may send messages to the teacher and the teacher can reply back on the same day. But then what about those students who do not have access and who do not feel confident in using it?

Many people have the idea of the World Wide Web as Internet. When then asked what is internet, they reply back: a means of communication and source of information. The WWW is changing and in my opinion, it provides a lot of opportunities for students to explore things. Students are not robots. It is not healthy for the students to just get instructions. Teachers need to let students explore. This shift makes the students less dependable and to a certain extent, more interested.

Technology is growing too fast. Is there a chance of schools getting closed due to e- learning and become itself a Web based learning community? On the other hand what happens to physical communication and interaction? And what happens to those students who need additional support?

A good Web based learning environment would better help a Web based learning community to communicate, share resources and experiences. Thinking of an example of a situation of high level participant interaction would be when the participant shares/access his/ other's resources. In addition to this, when s/he takes part in discussions, the participant’s experience grows. A situation in which a middle level of interaction takes place is when the user has access to other’s resources without sharing his material then making little use of the resources available with very little interaction would be regarded as a low level of interaction.

All this seems to be very easy to perform. However I think that before action takes place, a lot of thinking and planning has to be done. It involves a lot of work and for some people it may be more difficult to access and to understand then others. One has also to keep in mind the needs of the people. When using this technology every need has to be catered in order to have full accessibility.