and at what level of involvement they have. I don't want to go into detail about each of them as you are free to read the book at your own leisure. As I am not teaching right now so I read this through the looking glass of my job right now and thought about what is a problem we are currently facing that needs to be solved and what level would it fit into. The biggest project that I am facing has to do with our actual curriculum. eDynamic Learning started about 6 years ago when the owner started writing courses that his school wanted to offer. Without going into too much detail about how we got where we are today, what you should take away from that last statement is 6 YEARS AGO. That means some of our courses are just that old!!! In online programs, it is easy to change content so you might not think that this is an issue... well it is! In order to keep our courses all completely up to date and without relying on clients to tell us that something needs updating, I need a team to work with me to create new editions of the courses. We need a fact checker, writers, editors, animation specialists, html writers, narrators, and LMS specialists. All of these people need someone to manage them and their interaction with each other. Horn and Staker say in the book that "When there is a predictable interdependence between groups, managers should organize a lightweight team to handle the project." The lightweight model of a team requires a project manager, which would be me and I would oversee the team and everything they are doing so the courses come together smoothly. I just went through a full revision of our Social Media course and it is quite the job to keep organized. If I had to relate this to my teaching, I would be looking at blending my old Math 10 class so they had more control over time and pace. In this environment, I would not really need anyone else involved at first so it would fall into the functional level school project and hopefully move to a more complex level as teachers caught on and we move to a school wide blended learning initiative. Want to learn more about blended learning? There are many videos on youtube but here is one to get you started
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This question was posed to us this week in our OLTD 511 class: If you could go back in time and design your own learning environment what would you create for yourself? You might be surprised to find out that this is a questions that I have pondered before this course. I was a very different learner in high school. VERY different! I wanted to get my assignments, ask some clarifying questions then get my work done as soon and as well as I possibly could. I found that there was a lot of wasted time in a mainstream classroom and it drove me absolutely mad. I did not want to listen to the lectures and all the stupid questions that all the other students had when I already understood. I actually ended up skipping a lot of school while still achieving A’s. I used to call it “time management” and it frustrated my teachers to no end. I am at my best when I have several tasks on the go at the same time. I don’t like to concentrate on a single task at hand. I need to have several projects on the go and music in the background. I like to think about each task as I work on a different one. Actually… to put it into perspective, below is an actual screenshot of my desktop right now and I have The Highway playing on my iPhone. As you can see, I like to have a lot on the go. Most high school classrooms do not allow for this form of multitasking or music. You are given an assignment and a time frame to finish it and you must doing it while quietly sitting at your desk.
With the very unique way that I work, if I could go back in time and create my own classroom I think it would need to be much like my office is right now but with the additional support of the teacher. I would most definitely learn best in a blended learning classroom as I like to work at my own pace and have a lot on the go all at once. Although I would prefer to do all of my schoolwork online, I would need the support of the teacher. Not only to answer clarifying questions but I remember many of the lessons I learned from teachers throughout high school that were not subject based. They truly helped influence who I am today. If you don’t know much about blended learning, here are a few articles to get you started. What Is Blended Learning? The Blended PLC Blended Learning: Making it Work in Your Classroom |
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