Week 5: RUBRICS, ALTERNATIVE ASSESSMENT, PBL AND WEQUEST.

MOVING HIGHER AND HIGHER!

Hello everyone!

Here is a small reflection about week 5 learning.

I read about Alternative Assessment and discuss on it on Nicenet. Through this reading I learned what is an alternative learning. I have a lot to say about it but let cut a long story short. Alternative learning is learning by doing. The students do the work by themselves. They are at the center of the teaching/learning process. The teacher plays the role of a facilitator, a guide; encouraging, motivating learners. The students with the help of the teacher improve their communicative skills by interacting with one another, assessing themselves and their peers. Alternative learning is an active learning. The experience shows that this method is motivating the learners, because the learners in general, be they youngs or adults like  to be considered, responsibilized, valued...Alternative learning provide them with these aspects.

What about Rubrics?

They are wonderfull tools for assessments. I usually use a rubric to assess the students but this time I learned more about rubrics. There are different types of rubrics and it is very easy to create a rubric through Rubistar (http://rubistar.4teachers.org/)

For PBL (Project-Based learning) I believe it is a great project, where students have their own pace for learning. They learn from one another. PBL copes very well with rubrics because the students need to know what to do, and how they will be assess.

As for the Project Task step 4, I tried to find a technological solution to my students poor expression and shyness. I am quite sure, the website ByGosh (http://bygosh.com), could be one of the medicines.

At last, I did an exciting Extra Credit task by creating a WebQuest (http://www.webquest.org/search/index.php), (http://www.Zunal.com). I discovered the usefulness of webquest in the sense that it is interesting and motivating. It also helps the students develop critical thinking, problem-solving and decision making skills. What I appreciate much is that it includes cooperative learning.

Bye-bye!!!

Thank you all!

Your comments and contributions are welcomed.

Bernadette

Week 4: -TECHNOLOGY EMPOWERS TEACHING AND LEARNING.

Week 4: Technology Empowers Teaching and Learning.

• Skill-Building Websites For Reading/Writing Skills and Technology enhanced Lesson Plans.

Week 3 reflective post

Week 3: MOVING AHEAD WITH:

• Oral/Aural skill Building Websites 
• Using Delicious.com to store useful links.

Week 2: WEB SEARCHING

Greetings to you from Burkina,

This is the second week of our lovely travel with technology. I have been busy, going up and down.
I learned a lot through readings, and practices. I worked on web searching, ABCD objective , project step 1, and the reflective blog I am doing now. I've been so happy looking at classmates reflections.
I notice that little by little I am getting used to the course materials. I do believe that technology is also for me, Great!

For the week assignments I started dealing with the objectives, especially the ABCD  method of writing objectives. Why did I start with it? Simply because writing objectives is the cornerstone of a good lesson plan. I struggle with it each time. Of course a well written objective I mean a clear objective can help the instructor design the lessons that will be easier for the students to comprehend and the teacher to evaluate, to speak like Jones,1997. It paves the way for both, learner and teacher. The students clearly know where they are going, what they have to do. I can assert that writing a clear objective is not an easy task.

The great discovery I did this week is web searching that's why I keep it as a title of the second week blog. I usually use Google or google scholar for my researches. Now I discovered a wonderful tool which is a web searching engine: Noodletools.com, a good website for education. I will deepen my knowledge of this web site. My Favorite is iseek, good for critical thinking topics. I encourage you all, friends and colleagues to go to Noodle tools and choose the best research engine for yourself. Noodle tools is full of good engines for researches.

The third assignment of the week was the project. As for it, I described one of my classes. I found a lot of fun describing my own class. In general, I describe colleagues classes.

At last, I'm going to comment colleagues blogs. I went through some already. They all tell great things. Well done!

Excellent end of week for us all!

Bernadette from Burkina

Week 1 reflective blog

 Bernadette's reflective blog

Week 1

Hi everyone,
How are you doing?
I am very happy to start this online course even if I am struggling  from the time being with the materials. I think I am lucky because learning to create and use a blog will of course enhance my teaching purposes and my students learning purposes. I use to here people talk about blog and today I'm getting use to it. Blog is very useful for teaching and learning.
I hope and I'm sure this new material will allow me, my colleagues and my students to share our experience, knowledge and exchange lesson plans, activities and so on.
I've learn much during this orientation week. Nicenet is a great tool I'm not use to. But I manage through the instructions to get through.I do appreciate the first post about introducing ourselves to the class. It gives courage because I know I'm not alone on the road.The strategy of choosing a rubric which will be used for our assessment is also great. We know what we are doing and we are going to be scored. This is motivating and engaging. I've never thought about it. Next time I am going to use it with the learner I am in charge. Yes, I will try it out.
Students will find it challenging and nice because they like dealing with machines, and that will satisfy their needs. Also through blogs they will learn a lot. It will motivate them and make them eager and fun.
I am worrying for the high level of technology we're going to learn in this online course; why? because in my country technology is not really spread. It is still for rich people. I wonder how to succeed in making it easy for the learners. I'am not sure but I think blog is a public place. I wonder if their is no risk for the cybercafe to badly use our address for bad things.
Life is a struggle and ready for this struggle.
I wish all of you a nice journey,
A knowledge journey.
Bernadette, from Burkina