A moodle journey

Composition received

2006-01-20T22:43:00.000-08:00

I got the first composition from my student. Henry. I was very excited because the email was delayed due to technical reason. I got finally from another email accout. And I knew the email account was full and that's why my student cannot send me email. I marked it without delay and wanted to return to him asap. I marked it using the tracked changes funtions in the MS word and hope my students would be able to read it. My students were not familiar with this feature and I hope they will find it useful.

Technical failure

2006-01-15T17:33:00.000-08:00

It's been a few days since I send out the assignment. I checked the course and my mail box and there seems not reply yet. Today, I checked the course forum and found that a stduent posted a message and said that he can't send the assignement to my mailbox. I suggest him to post the assignemt onto the forum. I could have open an assignment box and asked the student to post it to it. In that case, I have more systematic control over the assignment status. The teacher has not explored the feature and students need to learn how to use this feature as well. The familiarity to the CMS becomes important if the course runs smoothly.

giving writing task

2006-01-12T02:44:00.000-08:00

I gave a writing task to students and waiting for their replies. After all the reading and discussion, students should be more familiar with the topic and they should have some ideas of the topic.

One of my worries is that students do not have enough language to express their ideas. I planned to give some language input but it is not easy. Evryone have different problems and I will wait and see their draft before I give them more help on language. I use a process approach of writing, and I hope students would benefit from this feedback process.

Course recommences

2005-12-27T19:41:00.000-08:00

This course has gone to a stop for three weeks. I was busy with my work and other stuff. The students were busy with their school work and study. The school had a series of activities to celebrated the 20th anniversary.

Over the Christmas, I started the course again. I have more time and the students have more time too. It is difficult to continue after a long break. I sent an email to students and chatting socially about Christmas and informing them the course will satart again after a long break.

I am preparing materials and tasks for them.

I received one reply from a student. She told me she was sick and I provided my advice to her. It reflected the email was useful and the connection between students re-established.

week 4

2005-12-05T17:57:00.000-08:00

Entering week 4, the course seems stopped. The winter has come and all the activities stopped. I sent emails to students. I told them about my weekend. I asked about their school life. I know the school had an Open day over the weekend. I assume it is the reason why students stopped the activities. I also asked students to write back and tell me their week. I hope students do not forget the course and remember it is a group and the teacher is here. The virtual learning is very intangeable. I hope a short email can give a personal touch and it is important in developing a sense of belonging with students.

modify the task

2005-11-27T08:30:00.000-08:00

I review the task and try to break down the reading. I try to make the reading task shorter and more manageable to students. I also set some comprehension questions to students. I hope by breaking down the task, students will have more response to the task.

A silent week

2005-11-25T23:03:00.000-08:00

This week is very quiet. I assigned readsinf and set up two new forums for posting reading feedback. There is still no reply. I received emails from two students. They apologied for their absence and told me they are very busy with their school work. They are Form Five students. They are very busy with Quizzes and some need to prepare for LCCI. I gave them encouragement in my reply. I appreciate their replies because it creates a sense of community. They feel they belong to this group though they have no time to participate in it. The motivation seems to go down when the course progresses. I plan to set your post reading questions for students to answer. I hope it helps to make the task more manageable for students and students can take less time to complete the tasks. I also hope it can motivate students to have more participation.
I plan to give the essay topic to students after the reading as scheduled. I want students have more langauge input and background knowledge before writing their own essays.

WHM

feedback from students

2005-11-22T22:49:00.000-08:00

I checked the course website and my course email in the evenin on the same day that I sent out Week 2 agenda. A student left a message in the forum. He said he is busy and I replied to him that's ok. At least, I know the computer system is working and it is a time factor. From the statistics of the course, I know there are students who visit the site but none of the students reply to the forum. In week 2, the tasks are mainly reading, I would to make the participation of the participants.

Some students are not responding still. I am thinking what to do next.

week 2

2005-11-21T19:26:00.000-08:00

Time flies and it is week 2 now. Last weekend was quiet and there was no posting and activity. Some students finsihed the first reading but many others have not responded in the forum. I spent the whole morning in sending emails to students. I drafted an agenda to all students. It mainly recaps what we did in the first week and preview what is going to happen in the second week. I provided link to some more articles. I set the tasks and add new topics for discussion after reading.

After one week, I found some students slow down their pace. I sent them emails to encourage them and motivate them to particiapte more actively.

There are a few students who have not enrolled or did not particpate at all. I send them email individually and see if they have any trouble in accessing the course.

I takes quite a while to keep track with the progress of all participants and provide timely feedback to them. Though I have only seven particpants in the course. I wonder the workload if I have more participants. I need to visit the site two times a day and responding to them and check their paricipation. I want to give them a personal feeling that they are being taken care of. i found this tactic works. The interaction is important in online learning. The turn taking will stop if I do not respond. Over the weekend, I did not check the website and did not give out new task. I found the discussion froze and the actviity stopped. That's why I sent out emails agendas to stduents and pull them back on track.