Moodle-ing

This week was helpful in covering the basics--and a few bells and whistles--of Moodle. Trinity adopted Moodle’s platform when I was still a student here, but I don’t recall using it in depth for any of my classes. I had to use it this past semester when I began teaching at Trinity, and unfortunately I didn’t seek out any help in using Moodle to enhance my course. I was confused by the multitude of functions available, the standard format of its tools (many of which can be rearranged, but I didn’t learn until later how to do so), and the process for editing existing configurations. For instance, I couldn’t figure out how to use the gradebook, so I kept a spreadsheet running all semester with the requisite formulas and weight tables, and periodically I would update the totals onto Moodle. It was a time-intensive and inefficient process, not to mention an utterly unnecessary one - would that I had only asked for help in fine-tuning my Moodle gradebook. Not only has OL101 has helped immensely in learning how to navigate Moodle more intuitively, but I recently met with TCC Computer Services and had them walk me through how to properly construct my gradebook. I’m feeling a lot more confident about the online component of this semester’s classes, even though that only consists of a few functions on Moodle (assignment submissions, readings, grading, etc.). Consequently, I'm less terrified at the prospect of constructing an actual online course, where the Moodle components would take front and center.

Technological Resources

This week, we focused on familiarizing ourselves with various technological platforms which can enhance teaching an online course. I was particularly interested in Jing and Audacity. I was not acquianted with either of these applications prior to this week’s lab session. Consequently, I was delighted to learn that Jing serves as a free screencapture tool. I’d long been curious about the technique of recording one’s computer activities in realtime, but I wasn’t aware of any freeware that could perform such a task. Thankfully, Jing is transparently simple, and it was the easiest application of this week’s palette for me to handle.

I was even more interested in learning how to use Audacity. When I was in high school, I spent way too much time figuring out every nuance of the basic wave recorder included with Windows 98. I pressed that program to the limit to meet my musical recording needs. However, despite my fondness for such DIY audio engineering, I really appreciate Audacity for its multitracks, ease of editing, user-friendly interface, and cost (free). I am in the process of starting a podcast for my graduate school, and this technology will be extremely helpful in doing so.

Thanks to this week’s crash course in programs and applications, I feel a bit more confident in the online class environment’s  multimedia milieu - it’s become a lot easier over the course of the week to imagine availing myself of a panoply of online resources to play to different learning styles, as well as to offer variety for its own sake. Not only will this help me in my online teaching, but I hope to incorporate some of these tools into my F2F teaching.

Learning Styles

I was curious about the comment in Smith's book to the effect that a teacher needs to know his or her own learning styles in order to adjust or correct for one's own biases, in order to adapt to the learning styles of others (Smith, 10). I took the VARK test and scored 9/3/12/5. For one thing, this means that I learn much more visually than I had previously thought. This past semester, I worked hard to develop a handful of graphic heuristics to explain some complex web of philosophical concepts. At first, I felt the need for such images to explain things to my students, but the more I tweaked them, the more I realized that I myself rely on visual cues to tie together different ideas. The more I refined the concept maps, the more helpful and available those ideas became for me. I began to wonder whether I had overestimated the degree of my reading comprehension, at least compared to my visual understanding. My personality type (INFP on the Meyers-Briggs) tends to be abstract and disorganized, but lately I've felt an increased internal desire (and not merely external expectation) for the organization and streamlining of ideas, particularly while revising conference papers and class lectures. This shift will be helpful in the future as I begin to structure online courses, which are nothing if not visual and well-organized.

I also took the Felder Inventory, and scored as a Intuitive/Visual/Reflective/Global. Unlike the VARK, these results did not suprise me. I am a “big picture” person, constantly referring specifics back to generalities. This past semester, I tried to develop a habit of referring each new reading and themeback to the curricular arc. At first, this felt helpful, because it helped each new idea to cohere in a larger story and conceptual framework. However, as the class went on, I began to worry that this global tendency was problematic – not only was I over-simplifying differences, but I also wasn't helping students with more sequential learning styles to work carefully through particular ideas in a step-by-step fashion. I was too worried that the new content would clash with what we'd already covered that I became a bit repetitive, and maybe didn't give that day's content a fair shake in its own right. I didn't trust the students not to lose the forest for the trees, but I began to lose the trees for the forest. This also played out in how I've approached OL 101: looking at all the links for Module 1 was overwhelming, so I opened up a slew of them and copied their content into a single document. My wife pointed out how needlessly time-consuming this move was, and I realized that I was satiating my own fear of approacihng specifics without a general structure in place. It's good to know this about my own learning style, so that I can adjust accordingly for the learning styles of my students.

Test, Test

Hi, I'm Drew Van't Land. Just checking to make sure this is up and running!