EDUC 5405G: Blogs

In an earlier post, I began talking about the use of an established social-constructivist learning theory as a tool for designing learning that encourages direct collaboration among students. Check that out here. Although I digressed into a description of the digital technology that students frequently have trouble collaborating in (wikis), I decided that in a later post I would explain my thinking behind that idea. Harasim's (2012) Online Collaborative Learning theory (OCL) (which I described here ) is aptly designed to scaffold collaborative processes for students. However, as I explained before, such frameworks have seldom been used in the structuring of collaborative assignments like Wikis. In our digital tools assessment assignment I did simply that- I justified OCL as a technological tool to support collaborative wiki assignments in higher education. This justification was made on two assumptions: 1) a theory can be a tool, and 2) an innovation or technology's ...

In a previous post, I announced my excitement and anticipation of a Trello extension in Slack. I was eager to start using the application, and I promised a follow-up blog post about it. Well, here it is! For those of you whose memory eludes them, our very own classmate, Tim Bahula, did a wonderful blog post about Trello . If you don't have time to check that out, I'll give you a quick rundown about the software. Trello is a collaborative tool that helps users organize and allocate tasks to members working on a project. Essentially, the application consists of "lists" and "cards" that you use to coordinate and designate tasks. Trello looked promising, and maybe it still is, but the honeymoon period wore off pretty quick for me. I was most excited about its seemingly seamless integration into our team's existing Slack communication platform. Trello appeared to have what Slack was lacking in task management tools. This is what Davis (1989) referred ...

In a previous class with Dr. Power, I attempted to make a case for incorporating game elements into teacher professional development programs. Although, I never designed a lesson plan, my thoughts were manifested in a poster presentation assignment. In this post, I plan to explain the thinking that was behind the creation of that poster as well as what my thoughts are about it now as I reflect on my professional development in the M.Ed program over the past year.  My arguments for "gamifying" teacher training programs came from my own initial experiences in the M.Ed program. As a novice ESL teacher and a new student in the field of education, I was overwhelmed with the daunting amount of research, theory, and general information that I was expected to quickly become familiar with. It was disheartening to say the least, but I found solace in the discovery that most other educators were experiencing the same pressures. In fact, research has suggested that teaching pract...

In a previous post, I explained that one of the most salient barriers inhibiting direct collaboration in wiki assignments is the individualistic predispositions of students that often cause them to work on such tasks autonomously. This means that students require scaffolding not to learn how to use the wiki itself, but the to participate in the collaborative processes necessary for their successful implementation as tools for knowledge construction. Several have acknowledged the requisite scaffolding strategiesnce necessary to evoke collaboration among wiki participants in formal settings (See for example  Jung & Suzuki,2015; De Wever, Van Keer, Schellens, and Valcke, 2009 ) and claimed that a framework must be developed to ensure their effective implementation ( Karasavvidis, 2010). However, none, to my own knowledge, have utilized existing theoretical frameworks as guides in this specific kind of social-constructivist activity. Harasim's (2012) Online Collaborative Learni...

In the M.Ed program at UOIT, we spend a lot of time examining the efficacy of digital tools for achieving favorable learning outcomes. Exploring technologies is a core mandate of our program and is so for several very good reasons. Digital tools and Web 2.0 technologies present an unlimited amount of possibilities to deliver engaging and efficacious instructional content, a plethora of methods for connecting to local and global communities, and numerous avenues of communication to foster collaboration. However, recently, a fellow classmate and I lamented on, what we thought to be, an unsatisfactory focus on educational theory and in-depth (instructor led) discussion. In lieu of this, it seems, we often go on to explore educational tools first, and then later justify their use with theory. In this way, it could be argued that we are contributing to a movement of theory led by practice rather than theory leading practice. Albeit, this may not be an entirely fair accusation of our program...

In this week's reading, Dirksen (2012) discussed the importance of designing for motivation. She referenced Csikszentmihalyi (1990), the pioneer of Flow model, which is, in part, characterized by learners being cognizant of the short and long-term goals and knowing of the immediate tasks they need to accomplish to get there. Dirksen (2012) used the Flow model to actualize her own framework for "chunking" goals (i.e. immediate goals, short-ter m goals, and long term goals). Her framework is depicted in below. The immediacy of accomplishing short-term goals acts as a motivating motivating for the learner as it keeps them on track to accomplishing the long-term objectives. Curiously, I wondered, how this framework can be applied in online environments where the goal is to have students collaborate on a task? Surely, groups collaborating together would require a similar framework for motivation as an individual learner would. I contemplated over what other theories or...