This Week's Links

To my non UW-Stout professor readers... I will add a few weeks, this week. Thanks for the note, last week. Here are some links:

Interviews with award winning Online Class Designers

Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL)
Way Cool Link....

Kids create their own video games - For Learning

Another post...

Wow, I have people who ARE NOT IN THIS CLASS following my blog. (They commented on my links from last week). Thanks (or get a life).

I just wanted to share another element of online education. WKCE Wisconsin State 10th Grade Testing. It is not ONLINE ! I have spent 4.5 days and traveled over 1500 miles in the past week administrating WKCE tests Face-to-Face. How do we do it ? Meet the kids in a library or hotel meeting room and have the students take the test the good ole fashion way. Sitting at a table for 5-8 hours with a #2 pencil.

If anyone from the Wisconsin DPI reads my blog.. Put the WKCE Test online ! Student passwords, log-ins... It can be done. The test can be timed, we can have proctors that check ID's, etc.... DPI Please move into the digital era and save TONS of MONEY if you put it online. No printing and shipping the books. The results will be processed faster and you could develop a killer data warehouse in a short period of time.

I have never been a big fan of BEST PRACTICES in education. I prefer to take a student based approach and adapt to their learning styles. However, I responded to a discussion post this week and thought to use this as the basis for my post, this week.

Online education is student centered and each student basically develops their own online learning style. I am amazed at how creative students are at finding content online that relates to class material. I had a great bar closing conversation with an employee of Florida Virtual Academy, at a conference. (FVA is the nations largest online high school with over 10,000 students.) We both talked about how cool it would be to allow students to develop a course. Just give the students the topic and see what type of course they would develop and the resources they would suggest. We wondered if the class would even remotely look like what we provide the students. We also wondered how difficult and challenging the student created assessments would probably be. The FVA employee said he would email if his boss approved the idea. (It has been over a year and no email)

Online teaching methods are also based on course distribution and e-learning platforms. IQ academy uses Blackboard to deliver classes. The tools available in Blackboard are different than Moodle and D2L and vice versa. I have seen teachers teach an entire class off a BLOG they update and change daily. I have seen some classes post an entire semester of student work on a WIKI. I have heard of some online programs that require students to MAIL-IN completed workbooks each month. The entire content and expected student work for all the student's classes is put into a monthly WORKBOOK !

As I have mentioned before, we need to keep online education STUDENT CENTERED and unique. We can not just adapt the best practices of face-to-face education and allow online education to become another 'version' of face-to-face education with the same Best Practices. I consider the entire concept of Best Practices as a static concept. No Best Practices in Online Education !

Online Education Junkie Links

As I prepared for this project I revisited some past Del.cio.us links that I had.. I saved them for a reason.. They are very relevant. If anyone besides the instructors visit this Blog, you might find these useful.

The Technology Gap between Teens and Parents

Totally Wired

This goes back to the topics two weeks ago: E-Moderators


Death of email for Digital Kids

Kids like to play online games - Not for the reasons we think..

Final Project

Final Project. This was a very rewarding professional experience. I have to admit that I am familiar with most of the tools used in this class for this assessment. However, I never pieced them together to create a comprehensive assessment for students. I look forward to applying these multiple form of assessments to develop an unique authentic assessment. I definitely feel I have developed a toolbox approach to helping my students online. I have used the tools, but never have but them in the same box. However, I am once again experiencing a conflict between face-to-face an online education. The face-to-face department chairs in our district are focusing on ONE common assessment to be used by all teachers in the entire district, for a specific class. I have learned from this project that ONE ASSESSMENT is not the best way to assess student learning. Nor is confirming to traditional objective or common project based assignments. I will continue my quest to keep online learning from becoming an extension of face-to-face learning and will fight to keep online learning an unique student centered form of education.

Here is a link to a draft of my project:
Attempted Project Link

What do you do online ?

Trying explaining to neighbors at a Halloween Party that you are an online teacher (That is why you are home all day..that is all they really want to know...) Throw in the festive cheer, costumes, the crazy drink concoctions, low and behold this makes a good blog post.

What is the role of an online teacher? The guide on the side, cybercoach, online instructor, are all terms I frequently see describe online teachers. I prefer to consider myself a ‘course manager’ of the classes that I teach online, However, I have to admit the most time consuming task of teaching online is answering email. I have had to gain the skills of a “Lifehack” to learn how to manage the volume of email I receive each day.

As a class manager, I feel my task is to provide content, keep discussions on track, offer knowledge about content, provide insights, and weave together various student discussion threads and course components, all well trying to empty my ‘inbox’ each day. I sometimes wonder why all this needs to be carried out by the same person.

The best advice that I can give an online teacher is to be as flexible as you can! The individuality of online learners, requires teachers to remain flexible. Be patient, be willing to answer a lot of questions, provide positive feedback, and do not expect a lot of student work at the beginning of a semester. Teachers do not have the DAILY contact and INFLUENCE on students as classrooms teachers. Online teachers cannot plan on presenting an elaborate lesson plan on a daily basis. Online teachers must avoid being the “authority figure” and instead focus on communicating with students and encouraging consistent class participation.

Cyber-Coaching and Online Teaching:

Be Flexible, I let things roll off me on a weekly basis. I just laugh at some of the things that use to upset me in face-to-face classrooms.

Encourage Participation: Mass emails, personal emails, phone calls and if all else fails offer Extra Credit if they log-in, make posts, submit an assignment by Friday, etc.

Be Objective: Assess work on quality, not when it was submit.

Try to encourage connections between students. Study-Buddies, Commenting on Posts, Introduction Interviews, Group Projects, off topic discussions, attempt to get students to connect onine.

Find Unifying Elements: Have students suggest websites, YouTube videos, student blogs, that relate to content.

Conflictiing Opinions: Have students post conflicting posts, promote debate, peer critiques within the class.

Take a deep breath, from some good internet audio content, be ready to answer a lot of email, and watch the students learn !

I just need to get some of those neighbor drink concotions and figure what to do for this final project...

Online Discussion Boards-Rubrics

I have students in my online classes frequently post to in class Discussion Boards in Blackboard. I have students write both formally and informally. I also students ask students to write for a vareity of audiences and using a different voice with their writing. However, I have over 300 students and the workload can be difficult. I have found these websites to provide me with some rubrics to assess student Discussion Board posts:

Blackboard Discussion Board Overview
Basic Rubric
Effectively Managing Discussion Boards
Rubric for Asynchronous Discussion Participation

This is starting to come together...

I have to admit, it took me a while to determine how this class would work and the value it would have for me as an online teacher. The two previous online classes related to online teaching, were not very beneficial to me professionally. In this class (UW-Stout Assessment Class) I was initially frustrated that we could only view Module’s one week, at a time and had no idea how I was going to get ‘new’ ideas to improve my online teaching skills.

I am beginning to determine how this class is going to impact my online teaching. I was looking for some ‘magic’ assessments to add to my classes. I am gaining the tools to create my own 'magic' assessments. Preparing our groups mid-term assignment and reading the other projects gave me a variety of insight about how assessments can used in online classes. I am especially intrigued and find value from the students that are not traditional public school teachers. The emphasis on skill education discussed by the health care educators is very valuable. I never considered ‘skill’ training in an online setting. I am also beginning to understand the attraction and need for on-line training in the corporate setting. Teachers might have a place to work outside of Academia.

I have told fellow teachers that we must not make online education the extension of face-to-face education and just transfer the content online. Online classes (and training sessions) need to be unique situations the incorporate a variety of electronic tools, the universal access to information created by the internet, and the economies of scale and cost of savings created by virtual learning programs. However, we must also use the opportunity to allow students to creativity explore and exercise higher level of learning skills. Online classes (training sessions) and assessments can create these new types of classes and opportunities for students to learn.

The Internet allows teachers to create assessments for each level of Bloom’s taxonomy. The ability to use interactive PowerPoint’s, and electronic quizzes to instruct, drill, and assess basic knowledge is very effective. The ability for students to express their knowledge and creativity through user created blogs or websites is very powerful. The ability to work in collaboration with others through the use of Wiki’s, commercial products, email, and instant messaging, allows for true distance learning and training. The rapidly emerging online conference technology is making real time online meetings and learning a reality.

Many critics have claimed that online education will minimize the role and need for a trained teacher to lead classes. Lower level skills and information can be taught and assessed online with little teacher/student contact. However, the variety and rapidly changing tools available for online teachers makes their skill set even more valuable. A truly creative teacher can combine their face-to-face skills and the tools for online learning to creative dynamic interactive classes with multiple assessments.

Assessment and Online Learnging Tools: Overload..

Assessments and online learning tools.

Wow, this had to be the most intense week and the most information overload. The combination of reading the stock material, team members writing, and other group’s projects, I was exposed to a variety of assessment tools. The overwhelming response is that online teachers potentially have more assessment options, than face-to-face classrooms. The ability to duplicate online classrooms with web-based conferencing, student created e-portfolio’s, collaboration, class participation, peer-to-peer communication, and the online adoption of summative and formative assessments. The online teacher has an entire toolbox of assessment options.

The class readings called for the development of frequent diversified assessments. A well-designed online class can provide students with specific feedback, and specific information on how to improve their performance. discussion boards and blogs allow both teachers and students the ability share information about a students writing. The automatically graded quizzes and exams in many online classes can provide students with instant feedback, the correct answer, and information in a book where the correct information can be found. The ease of developing classes and self-corrected quizzes allows students to conduct multiple attempts of an assessment.

As online educator, I am frequently asked if it is hard to teach students that you do not “see” or speak with “daily”. Online teachers can create frequent communication with students through email, by requiring frequent Discussion Board or Blog entries, through online conferencing applications, or through traditional telecommunication. Online teachers have the ability to assess student work through all of these avenues.

The student-centered nature of online education allows creative online teachers to develop formative assessments. I would argue that the online teacher has more tools than the face-to-face teachers to use self-reflective formative assessments. The ability to use surveys, online quizzes, reflective blogs, discussion boards, and Internet based research all allow teachers to create student-centered formative assessments. The ‘reforms’ and modifications called for in the both in the Flexible Learning and Assessments of Understanding articles can be easily incorporated into an online class.

Our group worked with mixed success to complete the midterm project using the jigsaw method. I enjoyed the opportunity to work with a team and use the jigsaw approach to completing the mid-term. However, I have never experienced a lot of communication and success, in a graduate level class, with the jigsaw method. The busy nature and conflicting schedules of graduate level students seems to always make it difficult for teams to truly collaborate. Our group mainly communicated through email, and I feel it developed a high quality product, but primarily worked alone to develop a group product.

It will take me some time to process all of this week’s information and determine how I apply these technologies and applications into the online classes that I teach. The emerging concept that is capturing my attention is the student created e-portfolio. I currently use the Blackboard class management tool and a specific students work is posted in a variety of locations, within Blackboard. I see many benefits and efficiencies with student created e-portfolios.

Concept Mapping and Inspiration

Concept mapping (and the Inspiration software) is a great tool for teachers to develop ideas and use as a classroom tool. The concept map is a great way for teachers develop ideas, link ideas, and create assessments. I have also participated in a workshop where teachers, from different subjects, worked together and combined concept maps to create to seem common elements, in their classes and develop common cross-curriculum assessments. It was a very powerful way to see common benchmarks, learning objections, and collaborate with teachers from other subjects.

Concept mapping (and using Inspiration) involves technology and software. Many teachers are still ‘afraid’ of software. In the classroom, it involves access to the software and allowing students to develop their skills with the software. In the classroom, I have found that concept mapping does not apply to all learning styles. Using concept mapping is a way to differentiate learning, but might not be effective with all students.

I have personally found that many students use Inspiration at the elementary and middle school level. However, at the High School level, they find it ‘juvenile’ or not a tool they want to use in High School. I experienced some resistance when having students create inspiration-based assignments.

Can Bonk's Perfect Storm be stopped ?

he Bonk article infers that the e learning is an education institution that will inevitably become part of mainstream American education. As an online teacher, and witness of the benefits and success of online learning, I agree with Bonk’s arguments. I have been comparing online education with the “alternative” school concept that originated in the 1980’s and was fully implemented in many Wisconsin schools in the 1990’s. Traditional schools were forced to create ‘alternative’ schools for their at-risk, credit deficient, or non-traditional students. With emerging technology, changing learning demands, pedagogy shift. and budget benefits, public schools districts (and universities) will be required to offer online learning options for all their students.

The two elements Bonk’ storm arguments that I agree the most with are pedagogy and budgets. I could not agree more with Bonk’s statement that “millions of learners are signing up for online courses. Unfortunately, many of them quickly become bored online learners who plead for more rich and engaging online experiences.” I experienced this first hand. I have had the unique opportunity to become involved in the beginning stages of an online high school. When our program began many of our classes used out dated textbooks and an education model that involved reading the book, doing a worksheet “type” activity with a Word document, take an online quiz, and complete a multiple choice assessment with a few essay questions. I feel, as a result, our course completion rates were less than 50%. Over the last few years, with new vendors, working with our course content builders, and allowing teachers to redesign and modify class content, the content, quality, and interactivity of our classes has improved tremendously. As result, we are beginning to see improved course completion rates. The emerginging technologies and changing demands of students with force teachers (and online content providers) to constantly re-evaluate and re-design online courses and assessments. In tradtional education, with my redesign a class when a new textbook is purchased. Online classes will have to be reviewed and updated on an annual basis.

The ‘financial’ reality of our countries economic situation is going to continue to impact publicly funded education, at all levels. Corporations or educational organizations cannot ignore the inherent cost savings of online classes. The ability to attract students (and tuition) from any geographic area can be practiced at both the University level and High School level. My employer, The School District of Waukesha, has never denied that one of the main reasons for starting the IQ Academy Charter High School was the potential to increase revenues for the school district of Waukesha. The geographical mixture of students from this class, outside the Menomonee, WI and traditional UW-Stout area is a strong example. The present and rapidly emerging cost effective technologies and potential additional revenue streams can be applied to all areas of education and training.

Week 3 Reflections from the Online Office..

What are online assessments? ... As we continue to be exposed to more information in this online assessment class, I am coming to the conclusion that Assessments are not Episodic, in an online class. I argue that teachers do not fit the traditional roles in an online class. Online Teachers 'set-up' e learning class with a variety of traditional and web-based content and activities and allow students to work independently. During the course of a semester the teacher does not provide direct instruction, but serves as an educational mentor. Traditionally, I felt my roll, as an online instructor was to monitor progress. However, I am beginning to change my view and realize that my role also includes providing a variety of frequent of assessments. These assessment’s can be varied, on traditional, and yet to be defined. Traditionally my classes have been set up with traditional exams and discussion board posts as assessments. However an end of the semester episodic exam or student created project determined the bulk of the student’s grade. This class is making me realize that a well designed class features of variety of frequent assessments with less dependence on a few episodic exams or projects.

I am also becoming more aware of the need (and lack) of communication between traditional education organizations and online programs. In my situation, at IQ Academy of Wisconsin, we have operated on an organizational island. I do not think our district department head’s, administrators, and traditional high school personal understand the operations of our program. In order for online programs to develop and advance we need to work with representatives from across our educational community.

Traditional school and online programs need to work together in the area of assessments. The School District of Waukesha has an emphasis on common assessments. Operating in an online high school, I feel I am being encouraged to develop assessments and conform to the practices of the traditional face-to-face schools. How can an online teacher be encouraged to develop a common assessment with a face-to-face teacher? How can I help a face-to-face teacher develop a comment assessment that would benefit their traditional classroom? The reality is that in order to work together on common assessments, we need to develop a mutual understanding of face-to-face and online pedagogy. The reality of Bonk's perfect e-storm needs to be acknowledged and embraced by representatives across the entire educational community. How can the two forms of education work together? I ask this question? In the next 5 years will traditional learning classrooms look more like online learning? or will online learning look more like traditional face-to-face classrooms?

Who is this Guy ? Partner Interiew

Eric Lehmann taught Social Studies for 14 Years at the high school level in the School District of Waukesha. He has since been teaching 4 Years online as part the IQ Academy Virtual High School in Wisconsin. IQ is an open enrollment charter school that has students from the entire state of Wisconsin.

Before teaching he worked 2 years for both Senator Kohl's re-election campaign and with the Milwaukee Bucks. To his surprise politics and pro sports were over-rated and inter connected.

Something we would never guess about Eric is he sails and power boats. His goal in life is to boat all the continents (North and South America so far..) and he wants to snorkel/dive the Great Barrier Reef before he dies.

Eric cherishes his family and 3 kids, 12 Year old daughter and 9 Year old twin boys..

Teacher-Centered vs. Learner-Centered

Online learning is the ultimate Learner-Centered education experience. I feel, it is an essential paradigm shift for teachers that gravitate to an online position. The teacher's main role is a coursework designer and education mentor. The teacher no longer controls the content through lectures and deadlines. Ultimately the student is an autonomous learner that processes knowledge on their own with limited assistance from a teacher or peers. The teacher and professor must make available clear content and resources for students, online.

I have seen several great collegues struggle as online teachers because they can not control student learning, in an online environment. Several teachers are use to having a classroom where they control the content and learning on a daily basis. The teachers struggle because, in the online environoment teachers must make content available in large portions (or an entire semester) and trust students ability to work without teacher supervision. The "ultimate" student centered education experience is the program, without deadlines. Students are free to explore content on their own time schedule and sequence.

Edu Blogs - Work Alone or in Collaboration ?

Wang – Pro’s and Con’s

The Wang and Fang article was a case study on the benefits of Blogs in cooperative learning. During the article I developed my own thesis. How do the online learning styles of students at various levels differ? Do you High School; Undergraduate, and Graduate students have different online learning styles?
I found the article very interesting and relevant to my online classes. I have found that online High School students are very autonomous learners, in our program. I have tried to incorporate some group activities into my classes, but the activities and tasks have not been successful. I have attempted group break out sessions in our Elluminate web-conferencing sessions, group Discussion Board posts, and traditional partner or group research projects. The participation the activities have been minimal and the quality unsatisfactory. I have not attempted to create a group blog page.
However, this my third online graduate level course, as a student. The two previous classes (and this class) have relied heavily on cooperative learning concepts and developing collaborative assessments. The online classes that I have participated in have had more positive interdependence compared to the autonomous learning that takes place in the online classes, that I teach. Is this related to prefer learning style or class design?
I am very intrigued about using Blogs to promote writing, assess student work, and foster cooperative learning. However, the frame of reference that I compare a Blog to is the Discussion Board feature of Blackboard. (Similar to the Discussion area, of this class). Several of the negatives conveyed in the 7 Things you should know about Blogs article can be addressed if the Blog is hosted in a controlled area, not on the open web.
The posts are ‘not’ public. The teacher has the ability to structure the process, edit, and control posts. Personally, I see the most potential by using a Blog as an e-portfolio where students can post and share their own writing, thoughts, work, projects, etc…. It would allow students to have ownership in their work and web-space. Students would have the ability to view and comment on their classmates work. As teacher, it would also give me a central place to view and assess student’s work.
Several of the negatives conveyed in the 7 Things you should know about Blogs article can be addressed if the Blog is hosted in a controlled area, not on the open web.

IQ Academy - Wisconsin - School District of Waukesha

I received a lot of questions about 'where I work...' I am High School teacher employed by the School District of Waukesha. Waukesha offers an Open Enrollment Charter High School called IQ Academy. Since it is an open enrollment charter school, our students are from the entire state of Wisconsin. Waukesha operates the schools as a partnership with KC Distance Learning, which also co operates IQ Academies in other states. I am full time IQ teacher that does not report to a face to face traditional school building each school day. I do maintain two athletic coaching positions at Waukesha South High School. (Another students, in this class, Amy Rosno, is a colleague)

To learn more about IQ Academy, click on the How it Works button.

Financial Crisis Background...

The following is one of the best Podcasts that explains how this banking crisis started.. It is a 50 minute podcast. You can listen to it on the net or download it onto an ipod. The instructions are on the website.

http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1242

Week 1 - Assessment Reflection

In the McLoughlin article, the author states, "Authentic assessment is solidly based on constructivism, which recognizes the learner as the chief architect of knowledge building," recognizing that the student is the center of the learning rather than the teacher or subject material….
I think this is also a definition of an online learning environment. Thus, I feel authentic alternative assessments are vital to a quality online learning class.

I have been teaching online for the past three school years and have attempted to use many forms of assessment. I will be the first to admit that many of my forms of assessment have failied. Failed from the perspective that the students resisted or did not even attempt the assessments.( I have been giving the students the option of formal and alternative assessments.) However, the students that did attempt the alternative assessments (summative, informal, self) displayed an excellent level of knowledge and mastery.

The main reason I enrolled in this class was to become familar with and 'practice' alternative assessments for online classes. As an online teacher I have found that most classes (and teachers) typically use traditional formal assessments. However, as online education is evolving and online students are evolving, I feel that non formal assessments are going to truly differentiate online learning from face to face learning.

From a personal experience, I have used the interview technique with my students (as an extra credit assignment). The participation was limited, but the students told me that they ultimately ended up communicating via email several times beyond the initial assignment and developed a long-term relationship with their partner. Many students told me as a result of the assignment interview they heavy relied on that student as a study partner.

The survey is a very valuable online learning tool. I have used a survey in many ways at various points in a semester. Initially a survey is very effective to gather personal, academic, and technology skills, and other background information about students. During the semester surveys can determine both a students effort and academic knowledge. End of the semester surveys can measure academic performance and general feedback about the class. I have incorporated an end of the semester class survey into my end of the semester exam. As a school, IQ Academy Wisconsin has used end of semester parent and summer surveys. The surveys allow the school to gather a large amount of invaluable perception data.

I am very familiar with the Discussion form assessment and use (Blackboard) discussion board assignments in my class weekly. I have found numerous benefits of discussion boards beyond measuring academic knowledge. I use various types of discussion board assignments. Informal assignments can help students develop the writing process by turning ideas in posts, practicing self-reflection, and writing for various audiences. Formative writing assignments allow students to receive editing feedback from both an instructor and peer. Formal writing assignments allow students the open ended writing opportunity in non-traditional setting. (Essay Assignments, Short Answer Tests)

I am not familiar with the WIKI pages, in an academic setting. I am very intrigued with the opportunity it presents students and teachers. Blackboard classes are very static and rarely change over a semester. WIKI and Blogs would allow more up to date teacher and student content. I have found that many online high students are very creative and enjoy expressing themselves (and their knowledge) in non-traditional ways.