week 10

In this final week we are very relax because not only it is the shortest week of the program but it is also the least busy one. It is indeed the wrap up.

Short as it is, I have discovered two important models/frameworks to assess technology usage in the class. These models are:

 State of Washington: Tiers of Technology Integration  

University of Southern Florida: The Technology Integration Matrix

I liked best the last one because not only it is more effective but it is clearer and simpler for me as well. From the Entry level to the transformation level via the adoption, adaptation and infusion levels the teacher knows exactly what to do at each stage. What’s more, it incorporates five interdependent characteristics of meaningful learning environments: active, constructive, goal directed (i.e., reflective), authentic, and collaborative.

We were asked to give advice to the future participants of this program. I liked this section too much.

Talking about the course on the whole I dare say everything is perfect. The topics and concepts were all interesting and often new for me. For concepts I had ever known before, the course has been an opportunity to better understand them.  I liked best: Skill-building Websites for Oral/Aural Skills and Saving Bookmarks with Delicious (week3). On this stage I preferred the document entitled The Employment of CALL in Teaching Second/Foreign Language Speaking skills. The latter clearly demonstrates that the computer environment is highly motivating and less threatening psychologically.  Therefore, as modern teachers, we ought to change the traditional language learning context.  Other topics that draw my attention were Skill-building Websites for Reading/writing skills and technology-enhanced Lesson Plans (week 4) and Learner autonomy and one-computer classroom developed in week 7 among others. Week 2 also was very useful for me as we saw web searching tools and creating behavioral learning objectives. I received teacher full time training for 3 years at Faculté des Sciences et Technologies de l’Education et de la Formation (Dakar, Senegal) but it is with this 10 week-online course that I better understand how to set goals/objectives when planning a lesson. What I learned in this section was specially the ABCD method. Besides it is here that I have better understood the Bloom taxonomy.

 As far as technology tools are concerned, I think all of them are relevant for me. They are on the whole new for me. I have started using blogs, board discussions and e-mails. I will try to implement other like WebQuests, wiki, rubrics, power point, padlets and so forth.

 

 Today, with the end of the course, I feel very sad. I will indeed miss the professional and renowned instructors from the University of Oregon. I mean Donna Shaw and the whole team who were quite perfect, particularly Donna Shaw. I have learnt a lot of positive things from this brilliant teacher. She has been very pragmatic and very helpful during the whole training. Because of all of you, I am thinking about registering at the University of Oregon to learn more. Besides, we will miss the fruitful interactions and nice help from the brilliant participants of this program. Everybody was wonderful. I hope our interactions and collaboration will continue on Facebook, Twitter and through other social media like Linkedin.