Tag Archives: Access

W3 Activity 2 – My Personal Technology Plan

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My motto for teaching/learning online as I go forward is to learn something new everyday. Embracing new technologies takes dedicated time and an attitude that embraces change and improvement.

Technology Objectives

  • Macbook – Use Macbook to complete all EDDL work and assignments by utlizing each of the available tools such as IPhoto, IMovie, Facetalk, Skype, Google+, etc. The impact to learning is that I will be more fluent and adaptable with these tools and a stronger communicator/educator as a result.
  • KOBO E-reader – Use e-reader as a study guide for e-books to become more familiar with pros/cons, availability challenges etc.
  • Personal Learning Environment – Continue to use bookmark sites like Delicious or Diigo, as a new user, I am finding them helpful.
  • Productivity Apps – Learn to integrate various Apps (Cheddar, TagMyDoc, Dropbox) o take and share notes, create to-do lists, store files or organize academic schedules. I will investigate Trickster as it apparently helps you find all of your recently used apps and files. For creating lesson plans I will investigate iBooks Author to help formulate strategies for textbooks and reading assignments. This will all impact learning in a positive manner by increasing effectiveness and efficiency.
  • External Harddrive – As a professional / soon to be educator, I need to upgrade my archiving and security protocols to protecting my work. From this I will time machine my macbook weekly, or daily during high usage times, to a large external hard drive. The jmpact to learning of this is that I will be a more consistent educator with less technical set-backs that could potentially interrupt my coursework.
  • Flip Video Camera – Using a portable video camera to increase my comfort and expertise in filming different shorts. The impact to learning is that it’ll extend my reach to students who rely heavily on seeing and hearing, rather than reading.
  • Prezi – Create more presentations through Prezi to increase competency and clarity of presentations. The impact to my learning and the learning of others is that this tool is great for capturing attention in a way that Powerpoint is lacking. It requires a presenter to really know their topic, structure of presentation etc, in order to create an engaging presentation.

Proposed Learning Activities

My formal learning (courses) will include all of EDDL Courses this year, along with completing the TEFL Certificate which I am 50% complete.

My informal learning will be through various presentation tools like Prezi to help communicate various concepts, iMovie to develop my video creation/editing skills as well as some note-taking tools like Fetchnotes, which let you jot down your thoughts in free-form quickly. I will also be investigating Dunno which can take a note and let a service do the rest of the work for you completely in the background. Once you take the note, you’ll find a series of search results from sources including Bing, Wikipedia and YouTube.

My professional development will go on hold for a couple of years as I am resigning from my job at the end of July to take school full time while working part time to market a restaurant Por Que No and to some degree undetermined at this time, a hotel Costa Paraiso. I will fund my own marketing PD, which will help towards to online education field as this will be the subject I intend to teach online. My skillset will benefit from PD in SEO Optimization, Social Media upgrading as well as in becoming Google Adwords Certified.

Impact/Involvement of Wider Community

I will continue to build my teaching network through each course I take with EDDL courses as these relationships are key to increasing your impact and ongoing education.

Indicators of Evaluation on Plan’s Impact

At the end of my EDDL courses, I will review my level of competency with these tools and whether I need to focus on new tools. I will be evaluating tools on an ongoing basis in my learning over the next year as well.

 

W2 Activity 1: Technology Hardware Found In Classrooms

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Took a look at the Tech Pictures and feel confident that I find ‘most’ of these things in my workplace.

What we have…

  • Iphones, Airbooks, Blackberries, Cell phones and Laptops (which like to sleep, when not touched every 30 seconds during a presentation) 
  • Speakers
  • Scanners
  • Screens & projectors (also mounted in ways meant to continually challenge, lol) and cameras.)
  • Flatscreens (meant to work for skype-type calls, but have shown to have connection challenges when video is on).
  • JAWS (32-Bit)…a computer screen reader program that allows our visually impaired staff to read the screen either with a text-to-speech output or by a Refreshable Braille display.

What we don’t have…

  • Math Manipulatives
  • Kindle (though will see students and staff with them personally)
  • Slipper (Portable CCTV)

What I am not really sure about…

  • Other assistive technology gadgets

Unfortunately, I am on a vacation away from the college so I have not been able to take the photos of the technology I have available, so making a gallery or slideshow will have to wait until further into my homework. Looking forward to it.

W2 My Access to Technology

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Working for a BC college, we have access to all forms of computers (ipads, laptops, desktops etc), as do our students.

Bandwith

The bandwith can be an issue in the interior of BC with shaw.ca in residential but at the college we never seem to have trouble streaming videos, or uploading with ftp etc. Students are another story though as they will often be using residential connections. We have trouble uploading large videos, presentations, and photo albums.

Technical Support

We we have an IT dept that helps out the faculty and students so that is very helpful. Unfortunately, they are bound by our server and network systems as they are currently formatted (e.g. Not a lot of room on shared drived for storage or access from each campus to the same shared drives etc).

Ongoing PD & Directives

As a college, our faculty have a PD allowance every year and are encouraged to use it. Our Teaching & Learning Institute (http://selkirk.ca/research/tli) often brings in different speakers to help educate staff. We recently hosted a vodcasting workshop (http://selkirk.ca/news/selkirk-college-embraces-vodcasting-technology-teaching)
that was well attended by staff.

Regulatory Environment

As far as regulations go, there are always the privacy issues on sharing of emails from students without direct permission. This has come into play with e-newsletters being hosted outside of our secure network. This is contrary to the BC laws. This limits us in using email systems like createsend.com for student e-newsletters etc.

We have various college policies such as http://policies.selkirk.ca/policy/7110/ around use of electronic equipment, http://policies.selkirk.ca/policy/9300/ for computer assistance, http://policies.selkirk.ca/policy/8630/ for student email usage that will have an impact as well.