Jen Boisvert’s Blog

So, in less than one week the site admin area of Edublogs changed. It threw me for a loop, but I like the design a lot better. It is easier to navigate. Well, anyway onto my experiences over the last week. So here we go…

The past week has been a bit crazy, but it is slowly getting better. I am very pleased with my course and am very excited about it. I have shown a few people the layout and content of the course and they really liked it. They said it was simple, had a nice layout, and was not overwhelming. this was one of my goals, keeping it clean and to the point. I have been in some online classes where it is overwhelming and it tended to loose my interest. I brainstormed with a few people on some discussion question topics and they gave me some excellent ideas. It took awhile to come up with a few of the discussion questions, but after hours of brainstorming, they finally came to me. I came up with ideas earlier, but I wasn’t pleased with them. I just didn’t want to throw something up there for the sake of having a discussion question. I wanted to have meaning, be thought provoking, and really tie into the content. I am still stuck on the last discussion question though, Final Interview.   I want to use a case study, but I can’t find anything I really like. So, I am going to continue to to search for one or create a case study of my own. Just a few minutes ago Jess responded to my Part 1 of this blog, apparently she is going through the same thing with discussion questions. I am glad I am not going through this alone.

Creating the tutorials, the video Microsoft PowerPoint presentation, and Seesmic introduction was a bit challenging and a bit frustrating.  I have created a great number of tutorials and recordings, but for reason technology was not on my side.  Last Thursday, I decided to stay late after work and work on my recordings. It was quiet and I had the technology needed to create the tutorials and video. I created my PowerPoint presentation and tried to create record with Camtashia and it wouldn’t allow me to. A few weeks back, we got hit with a virus and it seemed to wipe away my Camtashia add-ins. The other problem was that I couldn’t get Camtashia to work properly. I haven’t used the program in a couple weeks so I didn’t realize that the bug plagued Camtashia. I then tried to use another program Adobe Captivate but was unsuccessful with that. I went through recorded my whole presentation to only find out that it didn’t record my voice. So by this point, I decided OK it is time to leave. I then went home and tried to record my Seesmic presentation which only led me to another roadblock. Everything seem to record fine, but when I went to play it back I could only hear audio but could not see myself. So I decided to give up on technology for the night. Luckily, I went back in on Sunday and my Seesmic video (both voice and video) were there. What a relief!

Besides the discussion, I have to update my checklist and my grading rubrics. But other than that, I am all set. Yeah!!! I can’t believe this course is almost over. Where did the time go? I have enjoyed this course and I can’t wait to get every one’s feedback.

Garrison’s article was very interesting and as I was going through the article I was thinking about my course. I particularly enjoyed reading about Social Presence. In an online course, an instructors presence is extremely important. In my course, I tried to create a welcoming and encouraging community. I am using instant messenger, the bulletin board, and a video and written introduction message to get through to my students. In their first discussion question, I allowed them to Google me (you will have to visit my course to see the activity). I tried to stress throughout the different modules that we are all working together and that we will get through it. I really like how Alex has created a welcoming environment in our course and I hope I have done the same in mind. I feel very comfortable in our classroom and am not afraid to ask a question. Classroom community is very, very important in an online course as all of the interaction takes place behind a computer screen unlike a traditional classroom where it takes place in a face to face setting.

Garrison also discusses social presence and learning activities (Garrison, 2007). In all of the modules I try to have them interact with each other where it be through a discussion question or assignment activity like Seesmic. In Module 8, I am having them create a video and interact with a classmate. They will be asking each other interview questions and then responding back to them. After they complete the question and response video, they will need to critique their partners responses. I am looking forward to viewing their videos.

Talk to you soon!

Jen (3)

Well, I have to say to honestly answer this question; I am a bit overwhelmed and off (keep reading to find out what I mean) this week. I completely overlooked the course checklist assignment that was due yesterday. I read everything in the module, but for some reason I missed the July 27^th due date (which is on everything!) and blocked it out of my mind. I was so focused on developing my own course and I associated the checklist with being completely done with the course, that I didn’t submit it. I thought it was due August 3^rd. I should have known yesterday when I woke up with an “off” feeling that the whole day was going to be a bear. If I only could have started the day over again, I would have. I totally blocked out a presentation that I had to give (Showed up to work dressed down when I should have been dressed up. We have dress down during the summer.) at work.

After reviewing the course checklist, I realized that I still have a good amount of work to complete.

I have been working every day on my course and some days I feel like I am making more progress than others. Sometimes I get hung up on something and instead of just letting it go or going back to it later, I ponder on it. I don’t like to leave things unfinished, so I try to stick with it until I figure it out or complete it. I have learned that sometimes it is appropriate to move on and go back and visit it later. One particular area that I got hung up on was the discussion questions. I still have not figured out two, but I have decided to re-visit them later on.

The checklist is quite helpful as it really points out things that I may have missed. I plan on using this checklist for my job as it will help me out. I am in the process of developing a course for work and this checklist will help keep me on task.

The next couple of days will be a bit stressful, but I know I can get through them. I just need to keep staying focused and take one thing at a time. (3)