Archive for Category: "Online Learning"
January 16, 2012 8:00 am
Moodle Hangout Anyone?
Moodle was launched as a pet project in 1999 by Martin Dougiamas. Since then, it has grown into an enormously popular learning platform that boasts over 57 million users who have access to roughly 5.8 million courses. Moodle is an open source, community driven learning management system that is used in traditional, blended, and fully online classrooms. Anyone can setup a Moodle server and start building online courses in a matter of minutes. Because of my interest in online learning, [...]
January 10, 2012 8:21 pm
iAm Video Project
Who are you? What do you care about? Who do you care about? What/who do love/like? What do you aspire to be? What does your digital footprint look like? Each semester I ask my broadcast technology students to create a final video project that is unlike anything they have produced so far. Yet, I ask them to implement all the skills, techniques and processes that they have already learned to successfully complete the assignment. I always wait to tell the [...]
January 1, 2012 12:00 pm
Need a New Year’s Resolution? … Try a Personalized Professional Development Plan!
Happy New Year everyone and good luck with those New Year’s resolutions. I have a dozen resolutions myself, but I don’t want to change too much! If I could get every educator to commit to one resolution, it would be to create a “Personalized Professional Development Plan.” While many dibble and dabble with online tools and social networks, I don’t think enough of us have a plan for organizing our learning with these tools. Here is my framework for what [...]
Just Try Something…and Share How It Goes
Making the move to a 1:1 environment this year at Burlington High School has been exciting. The move has gotten us a lot of attention from area schools that want to come out and speak to our staff and students to see how we got this point. Being a big proponent of sharing and the fact that we have a moral imperative to do so, we have welcomed everyone who has inquired about a visit. During the course of each [...]
November 14, 2011 8:00 am
Occupy Online Learning!
This past week I had the opportunity to attend the Virtual School Symposium sponsored by iNACOL in Indianapolis, Indiana. My primary reasons for attending this conference was to learn what others are doing related to online learning and to connect with various companies to help fill some needs in the online program that I administrate. The keynote speaker during lunch on Thursday was Steve Midgley, Deputy Director of Educational Technology, who through wry humor and insightful observations, encouraged and challenged [...]
September 19, 2011 8:00 am
The Coming Expansion of K12 Online Learning
K-12 online education has grown at a rate of 30% annually. Hybrid classrooms (a blend of online and face-to-face instruction) has also begun to gain traction in main-stream K-12 education. Despite these indicators, two factors continue to hold back the growth of online learning at the K-12 level: 1. State and federal education policy was written before online learning was a thought. Current policies, such as seat time requirements and funding models, unintentionally retard growth in K-12 online learning. 2. Like the [...]
September 5, 2011 8:00 am
5 Great Online Learning Blogs
When I want to learn about a new topic or be informed on issues that are important to me, I look for blogs and people to add to my PLN. This year I am focusing a lot on distance learning as I help launch a new online program for my school. Here are a few key sources of information and inspiration that I draw upon: 1. OnlineUniversities.com: Blogger Justin W. Marquis shares information about online learning in link-rich posts. 2. Disrupting Class: Clayton [...]
August 22, 2011 8:00 am
Online Learning Primer
There is a lot of confusion and misunderstanding surrounding online learning. I am currently in the process of launching a virtual school and have daily conversations with people regarding our program. Here are some comments I have received: “So you have webcams setup in all of your traditional classrooms and students from around the world just watch what’s going on on the real class?” “Is my kids just going to sit in front of his computer all day?” “Everyone has [...]
August 8, 2011 8:00 am
Online Facilitation: Important Concepts
Facilitating an online course is a lot different than teaching a traditional face-to-face course. Success in a traditional classroom does not necessarily translate into success as an online facilitator. There are some fundamental differences between online and traditional courses that explain why a different skill set is required for online instructors: In a traditional course, the majority of instruction is given verbally, in an online course the majority of instruction is written. In a traditional course, the majority of instruction is given [...]
June 23, 2011 12:00 pm
Attending ISTE At Home: Seven Tips To Enhance Your Virtual ISTE Experience!
ISTE is the mega conference of mega conferences; it is the largest EdTech conference in the world. ISTE annually draws over 12,000 to the conference and this year there are over 135 workshops, 700 sessions, and informal learning opportunities every where you go; ISTE 2011 will be held in Philly June 26-29. For a great ISTE overview listen to the latest EdReach show. Personally I’ve been to ISTE twice and never been disappointed. This year I won’t be there, instead of attending and presenting [...]
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