5318 and 5389 Contributions to Learning

This term I was able to participate in courses 5318- Instruct and Design Online Learning and 5389- Effective Professional Learning. I truly enjoyed the learning process I experiences with both of these courses. Both of these courses were very relevant in my career at this point. I feel that overall I was very successfull in these courses. For my work, I am rating myself 96/100 points for both 5318 and 5389.

In previous terms, it was more difficult for me to attend the live sessions because of my students busy extra curricular schedules. This time, I was able to attend most live meetings. I enjoyed being able to participate in the live meetings since I could ask questions and receive immediate feedback.

Glows and Grows

As I have progressed through these courses, I feel I have grown in my confidence of completing the assignments. In the past, I tended to over think tasks and was unsure about how to start. Developing a flow and better understanding of the level of work expected has helped me to be more successful in these two courses. In both of my courses, I was consistent in completing the class discussions. Not only did I participate in a timely manner, but I attempted to cite more from the course readings and videos than I have in the past. I also felt that I posted more with connections that I made to the readings in videos. This helped ensure that my learning was relevant to my current experiences and that it was meaningful.

Although I feel I have grown a lot in some areas, it seems that I have more to learn in citing my references properly. This is an area I have consistently received feedback on. I think being proactive in addressing this before submitting my assignments will help me grow moving forward. I plan to ask for more guidance in this area from my future instructors and ask my peers for feedback specifically in this area before submitting my assignments.

Collaboration

We have learned throughout our courses and through life that collaboration can be a strong tool for learning. I have felt more comfortable in building relationships with my virutal peers. In the beginning, I did not feel as connected with my peers, but have grown to develop stronger relationships and trust with certain individuals that have been through several courses with me. I have actively participated in our large Group Me chat that we have set up for both classes. In addition, I have set up a smaller, core group with 3 other members: Patty Hamilton, Jelisa Davis-Sophus, Khelia Williams, and myself. In this group we have supported each other by participating in several feed-forward sessions. We have scheduled a couple of Zoom meetings outside of our class meetings times to ensure we all have a strong understanding of the assignments. I have also met with Patty on Zoom to walk through Google Classroom and Canva with her to help determine which might be a better platform to work with when building her blended learning course. These large and small groups have both been vital to my success as I have been able to learn from others ideas. I also have been able to share my understanding of assignments with others so that they can have a clearer foundation of how to start their assignments. Below are some ways we have helped each other in these groups.

Learning From Mistakes

After participating from feed-forward sessions with my peers, I was able to make changes to my assignments. Seeing how others shared their information in creative ways, helped me to decide to add more graphics to my pages to add more interest in an effective way. I have also taken the feedback given from my instructors to make changes before submitting my final compilation posts. For example, I was given feedback on some of my font choices in my Call to Action design and immediately made changes to hopefully choose a font that is impactful but does not distract my audience from my message.

Deadlines

In this program, it is important to manage your time wisely. I feel I have kept up with the work-load and have been productively work in both courses on posting to discussion pages in a timely manner. Without doing this, the discussions could go stale. I have also turned in all of my assignments on time without needing any extensions.

Going forward I hope to continue my growth process, be able to have a strong team to collaborate with, and work toward maintaining high expectations of my learning process.