Essentials of eLearning: Reflections on Modules One through Three

It has now been several weeks into the course. I am digging my way through all the materials for the Essentials of eLearning with Jen, our instructor and my classmates. Or as one student’s article stated, “Slogging” through them. The modules are relatively easy to complete; however the entries into Diigo are so captivating that it takes a great deal of time to sift through all the information and correlate it with the concepts present in the Modules. I am beginning to understand the process of backward design and it makes sense. Although I have not built a course using the technique, it should be an interesting undertaking.

The first module covered learning online. Most of what was offered kick started my thought processes. Our discussions moved to Diigo and our personal comments went into that bookmarking tool, as well.. Once we began posting articles we found, it just made sense to comment and reflect on the entries being bookmarked. My first observation was the people in my course seem pretty serious about their comments. I wondered if intellectualizing was fun. To me fun is adding a bit of humor here and there, especially when one finds that he/she has misunderstood a concept in one of the articles or something someone said. Incongruence is the backbone of humor, I think.

Since I recently joined a gym (the local YWCA) and Weight Watchers to lose the pounds that keep creeping up on my body parts; I realized there were some connections between food and the material we were studying. I was immediately shot down by the seriousness of the conversations. I am, however, still very hungry for potato salad which is far too many points for this somewhat fluffy person to eat. Somehow this came up in one of the conversations. Okay, okay so I am a bit food sensitive! Well, maybe just hungry for whatever I want and can’t have enough of…for example, everything I can put into my mouth and chew (not to mention swallow).

Our next module was teaching online and here is where some very serious thinking on my part began. One of the major questions I am still asking is how you know your students understand the course concepts and can apply them? How do you build or design a course that will help them, and you, determine if the lesson was learned? Even though I have read much of the course readings and the Diigo entries, I am still struggling with these two questions. I am hoping as we work through the material and discussions this will become clearer. I have considered the metaphors of what a teacher is. For example, I see teaching an online course as a form of magic, where I am the magician helping students learn to work their own magic. I see myself in a variety of mentioned roles: motivator; facilitator; instructor; genie etc.; and/or I will be wearing many hats to design and teach online.

Finally, we addressed the question of online presence. Even though I have written a blog regarding the dangers of employers reading what you have written online, I still believe in people and the hiring entities that will someday decide to hire me or not. Therefore, I am not really concerned with an online presence and have not disguised myself with a different name or identity. I don’t believe criminals or terrorists or potential employers are out to do me wrong. I stopped being paranoid when I got out of the law enforcement field. As for someone stealing my identity…that would be interesting. I think they would prefer someone with more credit than I have at this time in my life. Someone younger might do it for them as well.

In conclusion it was stated that the colleges and universities are discriminating without consequence against older workers who seek to teach online. Now there is a thought to ponder. I suppose my first question is what else is new? Employers have been doing this without consequence for some time. However, I believe this practice, so widely held, will end up being counterproductive. Since the state budget cuts, colleges are trimming the fat from their budgets and part time faculty without benefits will make up even larger percentages of the instructors at these colleges and universities. Most young people starting out cannot afford to work for these low wages.