Letting students take the lead
After reviewing my course again and making the changes I found using the checklist and the suggestions from Alex, I think I’m in pretty good shape. I know that there are always things that I will want to tweak, but I think this is a good start. One big change I made was in my Music Journals. I added a forum for students to submit their work so others could comment on them. I also decided to require students to submit at the end of each module, rather than at the end of the entire course. I really don’t want to read all of those journals in the last week! It might be a bit much. I tried to add a journal, but apparently Moodle doesn’t do that anymore. Alex mentioned using blogmeister, but I need to check it out and play with it a bit before I am comfortable enough to ask students to use it. I also added forums for assignment submission areas so that students could look at each other’s assignments and give one another feedback about them. I think that students will really enjoy this feature and I’m looking forward to seeing how they respond to eachother.
What I have learned about myself during the creation of this course is that it is so worth the work! I can’t believe that I am actually nearing the end of this course. This has been a challenge for me, and I’m proud that I was able to make it through from start to finish…so far! There were some times during the development my course when I felt that I wasn’t sure if the direction I was taking was going to work. I discovered that if I am always looking at my course with a critical eye and am aware of of how I am organizing information and why I am choosing to use it, my ideas about what to present in my course become more clear.
Another big challenge for me has been trying to blend the best aspects of the online environment and the F2F environment. I think that I have realized too that students can be more independent if I am willing to let them take the lead. Students can be great teachers and asking them to work together to help each other learn is an exciting thought. In the discussion board I created for my chorus, last school year, I was amazed at how quickly the students took the lead. They even started developing questions about the class, almost like mini quizes. They also learned how to speak cooperatively in a discussion, which I think boosted the morale of my F2F meeting times. Learning online is a great chance for anyone to engage in an interactive community of learning. Building relationships in learning environments both on and offline can be the key to unlocking the potential of each individual learner and appealing to more than one type of learner.
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