2nd wk reflection

Hi World,
Two weeks down and I am still enjoying the Manage E Learning course. The reading has exposed me to many and varied learning techniques. I am excited to be able to teach in the future using ICT as an enhancement tool. It will certainly come in handy in my chosen teaching area of ITD or Industrial Technology Design.

One area in particular the Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge otherwise known as TPACK  I found interesting. As a teacher you must know your subjects content however with technology improving daily we must keep up with the course content. Secondly technical knowledge is also an area that will need to be kept up with. Thirdly Pedagogy the art of teaching will also need to change to meet the requirement of your audience. It is only when you can achieve these three areas the you create the optimal window for learning. So from this I understand that I as an educator will also be using the skills I learn on my journey to teach the next generation to teach myself. Is this what I signed up for ? Yes it is. We were to try in create our own version of the TPACK model, it is difficult to reinvent the wheel. I found the model below online and it sums it up nicely.

This week we had to participate in the De Bono's Hat Activity wiki "Mobile phones, should they be used in the classroom".  I found this activity opened my eyes to lateral thinking. It is easy for us to give a yes or no answer to a question however the concept of digging deeper and questioning reason, justification, hunches, optimism, creationism, negatives and calling for more information are often overlooked. I found my thoughts changing as I went through the color perspective questions of each of the 6 of De Bono's hats in regards to the wiki question. Although the questions for each hat are simple they enable you to drill down and answer the question honestly. If we can get students to think outside the box and challenge themselves with some simple questions I feel we can create a positive learning environment that will benefit society in the future. 

There are many benefits to using a wiki during a lesson or as a class resource. The learning theories of Behaviorism, Cognitivism,  Constructivism and Connectivism are all present in the wiki. Group collaboration anonymous or not online will enable students to be involved, hopefully this will increase their confidence within the group. Everyone thoughts become visible to the class. Unfortunately with resources like the wiki it is possible to delete someone's work without knowing you have done this, therefor it is recommended that your entry be done on a word document in the first place so it can be cut and pasted to the wiki, you then have a copy if this does happen to you. Using the wiki for this assessment was relatively easy, following the instructions actually works. Not something I do often follow instructions as I tend to learn from my mistakes, I have made a few over the years.

I think back to some advice given to me years ago from a supervisor which was "question why you want to do something that way, and don't take no or cant for an answer" he was actually trying to teach me the same principles of the De Bono's Six Hats. I am not sure if he new exactly what he was talking about theoretically however it was something I took on board.

3 Key points for me this week,
1) We need to keep learning as educators
2) Pedagogy needs to be adaptive to the situation
3) Think outside the box, challenge yourself

Bill

Acknowledgements:
De Bono's Hats diagram : http://www.metamagazine.nl/thinking-hats/
Vince Lombardi Quote : http://www.quoteswave.com/picture-quotes/60911
TPACK Diagram: http://juolan.blogspot.com.au/2009/11/reflection-on-design-process-02-supprot.html