EDLD+5368

Reflection
 __ Self-Assessment  __ Surprisingly, one of the main reasons that I am in this degree program was to get firsthand experience with online learning. I was asked to create an online course for new teachers in our district. It would give them an overview of our district applications and step them through the main features. With no experience whatsoever, I discovered the new term, Moodle. “Moodle is an Open Source Course Management System (CMS), also known as a Learning Management System (LMS) or a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) “(Moodle, 2011). Several co-workers suggested that I take an online course to help me get a basic understanding of an online learning environment. Looking back now, I have not regretted my decision to pursue this degree and I have gained much more than my experience with online learning. __ Learn as a Learner  __ “Online education can fundamentally the change relationship that students, teachers, parents, and the community have with their educational institutions and with one another. For policymakers, those transformations pose some difficult choices. If they ignore online education, they turn their back on their responsibility to extend learning opportunities” (NEA, 2006). The future of education, I believe, will include online courses and virtual schools of some form. The benefits for students are clear in providing courses that they normally do not have access to in their public schools. Students develop 21st century skills that will help them succeed in future jobs through online learning. This is reason enough for educators to learn how to design and implement online learning. Teaching the digital natives within the context of their world is a win-win situation. During this course, I learned to manage my time and have my course outline planned before trying to learn a new application. We had to create our course on Schoology, which disappointed me since a goal was to learn how to use Moodle. Even so, learning Schoology proved to be challenging, but I managed it with persistence and patience. The support was great both in our course with colleagues and with Schoology’s personnel. I designed my course with the intentions of implementing it in summer for professional development. Many of our teachers are ready and willing to learn how to create courses online. However, I discovered that there is some reluctance from our administrators and curriculum directors because of the need for guidelines. We don’t want courses developed that are not engaging and standards based. I don’t think it will take long before our district will move forward with online education and continue to develop courses that will be improved as we learn. We will continue to use it in our professional development classes and expose our teachers to this fast growing field in education. Our district will move forward with online education and will continue to develop courses and improve through the years. We will continue to use it in our professional development classes and expose our teachers to this fast growing field in education. I would like to aid in the development of online guidelines in our district, aligning it with the standards adopted by the North American Council for Online Learning (NACOL). According to John Watson, “In order for the benefits of online education to be fully realized, online programs must be sustainable, and online learning policy needs to be further developed to ensure this sustainability” (Watson, 2005). __ Lifelong Learning Skills  __ During this course, I learned some great management skills in planning and setting goals for the course I created. I was able to develop a love for research while looking for engaging material to use in my course. Reviewing the learning styles was valuable as I carefully planned to make sure they were all covered within the course. More importantly, I believe the most valuable skill I will be able to take with me is the experience in developing the course. My only regret was that we were not able to critique each other’s courses. I think it would have extended our learning if we could have reviewed the other courses in our cohort. References //Moodle//. (2011). Retrieved from Moodle: http://moodle.org/about/ NEA. (2006). //NEA's Guide to Teaching Online Courses.// Washington D.C.: External Partnerships and Advocacy. Watson. (2005). //Keeping Pace with K-12 Online Learning.// Naperville: Learning Point Associates.

Course Embedded Assignments



Week 3 Assignment: Schoology Setup Week 4 Assignment: Upload Course on Schoology: Schoology Week 5 Assignment: Reflection-Learning Outcomes