Along with frustration this Module kept me amused and thinking.
The frustration was as usual related to hardware and all things technology. It is difficult to navigate around when you are given warnings about 20% at peak speed before you are throttled down. Of course I could have stayed up all night with lots of other 'cyber friends' to ensure a faster speed and ability to download Scootle User Guide, but didn't. I will get the user guide at a later date; meanwhile I clicked around, finding Scooltle useful enough and a site worth knowing about and thankful that while my virtual memory was low, it had nothing on my real memory. Luckily I will be able to jog my memory as required. I reminded myself that because a program etc is given in a different form does not make its content better and look and read accordingly. Still I think it would take some time before I commented on anything if at all. While willing to give an opinion on most things it is usually when asked. I haven't reached the stage of seeing a comment box or the equivalent as being asked.
The amusement came as my daughter wondered through, making sure I was being careful in the social networking world (I've taught her well) and becoming more agitated as the course moves on. Her "Don't tell me you have to get a Second Life account too?" I suspect she can live with BubblUs, Google Docs and Blogger (as long as I delete my Blog once the course is over), but the thought of glogster, delicious and second life was becoming too much. It was an interesting moment really, remembering that networks and Web2 can become all consuming and lead to saying things you later regret. While I understand that a Web2 course by necessity needs to cover a lot of material; joining this, signing up for that and moving into a different kind of privacy requires some thought before introducing all things into a teaching program.
This came to light while watching the videos on Second Life. My initial thought was the concern of people living in an imaginary world where the imaginary world can become too real. I was quickly moved along with the Second Life Education videos, with my brain branching out and grabbing lots of possibilities. My daughter's horror reminded me to take things more slowly and consider if being able to move into the world of hallucinations to feel what it is like to be a schizophrenic would be a good thing. While this is an extreme idea from the video and there were more good ideas than issues, when using a tool in the classroom, ensuring the students are able to expand their use wisely and carefully and know how to critique what they are using, needs to be thought through.
A few quotes show some thoughts raised:
The ability to 'use words from our lectures and words from our textbooks and create a truly experiential opportunity for our students' is a great thing however remember it is 'not to replicate what is done in real life.' And summing up a comment on ehow regarding Facebook ' online privacy is a new life skill.' This is sometimes difficult to remember when caught up in the excitement of online possibilities.
No comments:
Post a Comment