Thursday, August 14, 2008
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Thursday, July 31, 2008
dailyPosts 07/31/2008
Any Flv Player - Software to play FLV video file and enable FLV playback on website, blog
elearnspace: Rumour has it, the web is big
- "We start at a set of well-connected initial pages and follow each of their links to new pages." It's that simple. Start somewhere. Follow links from there. That's learning today.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Thursday, July 10, 2008
dailyPosts 07/10/2008
Arkansas State University-Beebe Study Tips for Online Learning
UW-Platteville Distance Education Blog: Top 10 Tips for Successful Online Learning
Peterson's Distance Learning Advice - Study Tips for Distance Learning
Study Tips for Successful Distance Learning Email a Friend
* Tools
Before enrolling in a course, make sure you have access to the tools necessary to complete assignments. A word processor can help you to organize your work and communicate your thoughts more clearly. If your lessons appear through cable television, you'll want to know how to program your VCR to record the programs to refer back to. Access to a fax machine, computer with adequate hard disk space and modem for e-mail transmission are "musts" for many classes.
* Schedule
Set aside a regularly scheduled time for study. If you have not been involved in academic pursuits recently, you may find that your career, family, hobbies, and social and civic commitments leave little time for studying. To help you fit studying into your schedule, keep a record for a week of how you spend your time, and then decide what you are willing to give up. Schedule your studies for a time when you are mentally fresh and able to devote at least one hour to your work. Think of the hour as "reserved time." If you miss too many study periods, revise your schedule.
* Where to Study
You will find it easier to focus in an appropriate environment for study. Find a place that is free from distractions. You might consider work--before or after hours and on your lunch hour--a public library, or a separate room in your home.
* Reading Skills
You must comprehend and retain what you read for real learning to take place. Reading skills can be developed by concentrating on what you read and by taking frequent pauses to organize and review the material in your mind. At the end of a study session, review everything you have read, making special notes of important points. Reading a computer screen can be hard on your eyes; it may be necessary to download hard copies of reading assignments and communications from your instructor and coworkers.
* Communication Skills
It can be intimidating to speak into a microphone in a video or conference call, but your communication skills are an important part of any assignment--on the job, at home, and at school. Distance learning provides the opportunity to enhance these skills. Pay careful attention to instructions and be certain that you understand what is being asked. It often helps to develop a brief outline before responding to questions whether they are submitted in writing, via e-mail, orally, or on video/audio tape. Organization, grammar, and the appropriate style are important whichever medium you choose.
Presented with permission from Peterson's by Virtual Ink Press™Successful Online Learning: Tips for Taking Your First Online Class
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
dailyPosts 07/09/2008
The Difference Between Summative and Formative
What is formative assessment, then? First, it's not a product. That was the central misunderstanding of the administrator who asked for an example of a good formative test item. Even though assessments will continue to be labeled
formative or summative, how the results are used is what determines whether the assessment is formative or summative.To begin, let's look at summative assessment. In general, its results are used to make some sort of judgment, such as to determine what grade a student will receive on a classroom assignment, measure program effectiveness, or determine whether a school has made adequate yearly progress. Summative assessment, sometimes referred to as assessment of learning, typically documents how much learning has occurred at a point in time; its purpose is to measure the level of student, school, or program success.
Formative assessment, on the other hand, delivers information during the instructional process, before the summative assessment. Both the teacher and the student use formative assessment results to make decisions about what actions to take to promote further learning. It is an ongoing, dynamic process that involves far more than frequent testing, and measurement of student learning is just one of its components.
- Feedback: The Key Difference
- But if desired learning goals are the foundation of students' instructional experiences, then assessments of student learning are simply extensions of those same goals. Instead of “teaching to the test,” teachers are more accurately “testing what they teach.” If a concept or skill is important enough to assess, then it should be important enough to teach. And if it is not important enough to teach, then there's little justification for assessing it.
- The best classroom assessments also serve as meaningful sources of information for teachers, helping them identify what they taught well and what they need to work on.
Formative and Summative Assessment in the Classroom - Annotated
- Because they are spread out and occur after instruction every few weeks, months, or once a year, summative assessments are tools to help evaluate the effectiveness of programs, school improvement goals, alignment of curriculum, or student placement in specific programs.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
dailyPosts 07/03/2008
- Dubbed “the explainer” by popular geek publication Wired because of his viral YouTube video that summarizes Web 2.0 in under five minutes, cultural anthropologist Michael Wesch brought his Web 2.0 wisdom to the University of Manitoba on June 17 (see video above).
During his presentation, the Kansas State University professor breaks down his attempts to integrate Facebook, Netvibes, Diigo, Google Apps, Jott, Twitter, and other emerging technologies to create an education portal of the future.
“It’s basically an ongoing experiment to create a portal for me and my students to work online,” he explains. “We tried every social media application you can think of. Some worked, some didn’t.”
