And old friend and great writer, Christina Rencontre, has a blog on digital storytelling and new media in the classroom called Telling with Tech. Some good posts already and resources; definitely worth following!  url=http://crencontre.wordpress.com

Hopefully this gets me inspired to get back to blogging again as well.

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Flickr Photo by SuperKimbo / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Cross posted on IdeaPlay.org

A recent technology article in the NY Times online, “The Web Way to Learn a Language” by Erica Taub, anecdotally points to the success of one learner who “spoke in perfect American English” even though this young woman “was born in Iran and spoke only Farsi until her arrival here two years ago,” and she did this through learning on the computer using RosettaStone.

We occasionally see such claims that online or hybrid classes produce as good or better learning than face to face learning. There is also a movement pushing games for learning, claiming that learners are more motivated to learn content and skills when playing rich multi-player games such as World of Warcraft.

One thing that is often overlooked in these claims is a large portion of learner success in these programs might be attributed to the learners choice to participate in the programs or games on their own terms.

The NY Times article then goes on to point to the rising number of learners using technology to acquire new languages, and describes three such programs. There is no mention of why this woman chose to learn the way she did nor are any comparisons or evaluations reflecting on how well these programs perform or compete with traditional means of learning.

That she did learn American English well through the use of technology is still significant in showing that it can work well. However, would it work well for all learners? I think the true test of many programs would be to have a large sample student population required to take a “traditional” class and an equivalent sample be required to take the technology based language class. In either case many might not perform well due to a variety of factors from previous ability, comfortability in the learning environment, and overall desire to learn.

The same should be done with games for learning. Sure the students that chose to play World of Warcraft and lead a guild might have been motivated to learn the intricacies of management techniques required to successfully lead a group of fellow players within the game. On the other hand, how would a random group of students do who were required to play the game to learn management strategies fare compared to a group assigned to a traditional management class? Many might balk at the style of game or being forced to play a game in general to learn. Their game playing ability and learning ability will all come into consideration as well as their desire to learn.

We learn what we do mainly because we have a desire to. As complex human beings we also have different modes of interacting with the world that are better suited to some environments than others. If we continuously hold up online courses or games as great places for learning but neglect to consider that these courses and games are more often chosen by learners compared to other students who are often forced into traditional learning environments, then we neglect to account for what may truly result from a learners autonomy to choose what, where, when and how they want to learn.

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The main goal this week is to work on your portfolio site and your final technology integration lesson which are due as your final for next week–in essence you have nearly two full weeks to finish your final portfolio which is due on Thursday, December 17 at 11:59 pm.

To help you with your final lesson and portfolio, I’m including links to an example portfolio site I’ve created, some good example lessons from the Midterm, and a rubric to help you with seeing what you need to accomplish.

In this Example Portfolio, notice that the main page has a brief intro and overview of the portfolio site. The About Me section is more developed on its own page. The Technology Integration page has an overview statement (or could have a philosophy of technology use in education) followed by a brief description of individual lessons with links.

In these example lessons, note the use of mock ups or examples of work. Also that there is a discussion or at least focus on the technology integration in the lesson. This is one area where most could improve when adapting lessons previously created–you can often get by on less general lesson detail and develop the technology integration or reasons to use technology.

The Final Portfolio Rubric is embedded at the bottom of this post.

Finally, one of your two blog posts this week should be about the differences between blogs, wikis, and webpage sites like Google Sites or Weebly–what is each best for, why use one over the other, etc. ?

The other blog post is your choice but could but used to explore one further technology you’ve wanted to examine and could be used in as a mock up for your final lesson. And don’t forget to comment on group members posts as well over the next two weeks.

If you can’t find your fellow group members, they can be found in a link under the More menu in our Ning, here: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AsI0DFsPtAyAdGdiNGdBZjdvX3NVVklJUTNSOTVOc1E&hl=en

Cheers,
Greg

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