ETC677 Spring 2009

Common Question I: In the lesson, I will ask each group several common questions and specific question on your group treatise paper. These questions can be responded by any of your group members as an individual opinion or as group response. It is your group decision. Here is the first question. a. Please list five most critical elements of distributed learning "strategies" in distance learning.

There are many important learning strategies associated with distributed learning. There are 5 that I would consider to be the most critical: Collaboration - the opportunity to learn with and from others. Problem Solving - looking at and studying real life problems and finding solutions. Reflection - thinking about your learning. Articulation - verbalizing your thought, ideas, and learning. Exploration - the ability to learn about new things, new tools, new ideas.

Common Question II: How does WetPaint Wiki inhibit and/or enhance your group social interaction and social learning?

WetPaint Wiki enhances social interaction as well as social learning with groups because it allows groups to add documents to their group folder, edit them in the folder and there is an email sent to you to let you know there was a change done in your groups folder. You can create Wiki's to use for class discussions as well as working on individual projects and groups work. Wiki enhances the students learning by allowing a more hands on, interactive way of learning and creating assignments. Using Wiki's it allows students to be creative and enhance their technology skills. This is my first time using WetPaint and it was difficult at first, as anything new is, but once you work with it, it's easier each time.

Beth, Thanks for the responses! I see you addressed a few advantages of wiki work. How about disadvantages? Could you address some? Chih

Chih, A disadvantage of using wiki in the classroom would be if you are having students use wiki for homework, studying, or a project that needs to worked on at home not all student have access to a computer or internet. This would make it difficult for students. I know a lot of teachers who make assignments online allow students to come in before or after school or during free time to use school's computers. also, some school's might not allow the wiki site and it might be blocked. I know I tried to access at my school and it would not let me through. I am sure if I was to really use wiki in my class I could see about allowing access to the site but that also would be difficult if you are not able to have access. Beth

Beth, If I understand you correctly, we should allow students more time to engage in wiki activitites and be flexible with wiki as well. Correct?

I would say that the way Wetpaint or other wikis best enhance learning is through their collaborative abilities. Wikis make it easy to work on projects together - everyone can edit, add to, and share their ideas. They sort of add a real life element to online work. In real life work, each group member can add to or take away from the project. A wiki allows group members to do that digitally.

Suzanne, Great experiences in using wiki! Frequenly, I have heard students indicated wiki was a great tool for real world and authentic activitites. They have reservations on using it because they feel it could go out of control because the real world and auentic activitites frequenly are unpredictable. Wiki collaboration refer more time and more comittements. Do you feel the same way?

Chih, Real world and authentic activities can prove to be unpredictable and that is where the instructor/facilitator would play a part in helping the students to stay focused. And sometimes, that unpredictable nature helps us to see better ways to do things or other topics that need to be addressed. Yes, wiki collaboration can be more time consuming. However, our globalized society and research have shown the collaboration is extremely important today in all areas from engineering to education. The time we spend helping students learn how to collaborate effectively and efficiently would be time well spent.

Common Question III: Most of people probably would agree that all instructions should have integrated online (distributed learning) technology. Do you agree or disagree? Why? Please at least provide three reasons with good literatures to support your arguments.

I do agree that all (or at least most) instruction should include online technology. I am speaking pretty much from an elementary education standpoint but I think this also applies to secondary and higher ed also. One of the main reasons is student engagement. When teacher and/or students are using technology, especially online technology, students are more engaged. Well-known and respected educational researchers and theorists such as Hunter, Gagne, and Bloom even included engagement (anticipatory set, gaining attention) as part of the flow of a lesson. Our world has become so globalized over the past couple of decades and the development of online technologies has contributed to that as noted in the book The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman. In order for students/learners to be able to understand and use the Internet effectively for problem solving, collaboration, and communication we must include opportunities for them. One of the most emphasized 21st Century Skills is collaboration. It is one of the main skills being sought by employers today. As quoted by Dr. Tracy Gibbons of CoastWise Consulting: "The complexity of today's technology makes it impossible for any one person to know all of the intricacies behind a new product's design and development. Only 20 years ago, designing and developing a product were more of an individual effort, and organizational design centered on a hierarchical approach. Today, companies have to accept that rapidly emerging technologies, a global marketplace and an increasingly competitive and complex business environment demand workplace collaboration." The use of today's various online technologies (Web 2.0 tools) allows students and instructors to collaborate in ways that they have never done before and help to prepare them to enter a global workforce.

Common Question I: In the lesson, I will ask each group several common questions and specific question on your group treatise paper. These questions can be responded by any of your group members as an individual opinion or as group response. It is your group decision. Here is the first question. a. Please list five most critical elements of distributed learning "strategies" in distance learning.

The first critical element in DL is clear outcomes. I think that students need to understand what they should be learning. Second, there needs to be some sort of way of communication, whether synchronous or asynchronous. Students need to be able to communicate with each other and with the professor for clarification and to share ideas. Third, I think that there needs to be some collaboration. Students need to be able to bounce ideas off each other and be able to work with each other to accomplish common tasks. The fourth critical element is to use a variety of learning tools, whether they are in the CMS or using Web 2.0 tools. Reading articles and doing discussions is partially good, but their needs to be more to the learning environment. Lastly, I think there needs to be some way of assessing that learning. There is a common goal amongst all students and they need to know if they accomplished that goal. Assessments tell students if they were successful in learning or not.

MJ, Thanks for the response! You stated: "Students need to be able to bounce ideas off each other and be able to work with each other to accomplish common tasks." Is this collaboration or cooperation?

It is more collaboration. Like the discussions in VISTA, you can have cooperation without actually collaborating. Students have to put ideas on the table and be able to listen, accept, and even modify those ideas to achieve the task at hand. This is more collaboration than cooperation.

Common Question II: How does WetPaint Wiki inhibit and/or enhance your group social interaction and social learning?

We think that WetPaint Wiki can inhibit and enhance group social interactions and learning by: Enhance: * common group workspace * area for collaboration, uploading documents, and threaded discussions * work space is flexible and can be edited by the members * allows peers to collaborate on a project * allows for discussions * Only shows group work, not other works and is private Inhibit: *Can't always tell who replies to whom *Formatting not very reliable * can only work within group space (cannot bring in other Web 2.0 tools to WetPaint) * WetPaint is not within the WebCT "classroom" * must be utilized by all members to be successful *Editing can be a little difficult: may cause confusion as to who is editing * site may be down for "maintanance" : cannot login to work

Common Question III: Most of people probably would agree that all instructions should have integrated online (distributed learning) technology. Do you agree or disagree? Why? Please at least provide three reasons with good literatures to support your arguments.

As a group we agree, but it depends on how the teacher/instructor uses the technology. If used effectively: ~ Students likely to me on task more (motivates and engages students in learning). ~accelerates, deepens and enriches basic skills ~contributes to change in schools ~promotes student centered environments Source: http://www.nmsa.org/Research/ResearchSummaries/Summary19/tabid/275/Default.aspx also, -capacity to adapt to local conditions and evolve over time; -creativity and innovation; -crossing of traditional disciplinary and conceptual boundaries; -appreciation of diversity, multiple perspectives and epistemic issues; -community members who are responsible and skilled at diagnosing and addressing their learning needs; These were taken from: http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~bwilson/dlc.html

I referred to distributed learning as distance learning simply because I live in small town hours from Flagstaff & NAU. I feel because I am here and not there, it is "distant" to me. Also, because I am probably older than a lot of others in this program...when I started out here in Havasu taking my first non f2f classes, they were considered "distance learning" classes. I guess the name just kind of stick in my head!!! It is on-line learning, I do need to change some of the old terms I still carry around with me!!!!

Renee, Thanks for the response and explinations! You are correct that frequenly people refer distributed learning as distance learning. IN fact, it is not necessary. Ditributed leanring can be delivered in FTF instructions as well. I think it is more important that we need to understand distance learning embrace distributed learning becaused of effective technology has capacity to facilitate distributed leanring instructions. With effective distributed learning instructions and technology, students are physicially separated by distance may feel closer to the course, the instructor, and the classmates.