EDCMOOC: Review

Here is my review of EDC MOOC written for another blog

EDC MOOC Review at “Bytes and Banter”

(btw, there are many useful MOOC reviews by different authors in this blog)

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Know Thyself: Week 4 Mind Map

Usually I don’t watch video lectures online, because I prefer to download them. So I don’t see in-video quizzes that are given in most Coursera lectures. I tried to find another way to remember and understand material better. Making a mind map seems to be a good idea. However, it was a bit difficult to find appropriate tool for my method of mind-mapping: I use many elements, want to place them where I want on the screen and make lots of interconnections. The min map from this post was made with CMAP Tools – this is the best free mind mapping tool I found till now. First I had an idea to make a mind map for the whole course, but it would be too big and difficult to use. CMAP allows to make links between different maps, so I can still make links like “Ryle criticizes Descartes”. (I don’t know if I will make mind maps for previous lectures, but I’m sure I will make them for every next lecture, because it really improves the effectiveness of studying: I got 10/10 at Week 4 Quiz – first time got the highest grade at this course).

Click to see larger version (4927×2732)

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Aboriginal Worldviews and Education

This week this MOOC comes to its end. I think I will not have time to do the last Quiz, because I took part at two MOOCs at the same time, and the second (Know Thyself) is more interesting for me now, and I would like to finish it with getting a certificate.

The biggest problem with both EDC MOOC and Aboriginal Worldviews was for me, that they were too short. Four weeks aren’t enough for me to study something. Just when I start to feel connected with course’s topics and materials it comes to it’s end. And I think also, that both courses was overloaded with information, as for me. I would prefer to have same amount of information in 5 or 6 weeks. It is not about lack of time to watch all lectures and videos. It is about lack of time to discuss all what I want to discuss, to think about all this materials we get. Actually, I don’t want to sit at Coursera forums through all day. So I would like to have less materials for each week do discuss them deeper.

Studying Aboriginal Worldviews and Education was very productive for me, and I got some interesting ideas. Maybe I will write some of Activities this week, even they wouldn’t be counted for my grade already.

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EDCMOOC: Review

Here is my review of EDC MOOC written for another blog

EDC MOOC Review at “Bytes and Banter”

(btw, there are many useful MOOC reviews by different authors in this blog)

via WordPress http://7yukari7.wordpress.com/2013/04/21/edcmooc-review/

Aboriginal Worldviews and Education

This week this MOOC comes to its end. I think I will not have time to do the last Quiz, because I took part at two MOOCs at the same time, and the second (Know Thyself) is more interesting for me now, and I would like to finish it with getting a certificate.

The biggest problem with both EDC MOOC and Aboriginal Worldviews was for me, that they were too short. Four weeks aren’t enough for me to study something. Just when I start to feel connected with course’s topics and materials it comes to it’s end. And I think also, that both courses was overloaded with information, as for me. I would prefer to have same amount of information in 5 or 6 weeks. It is not about lack of time to watch all lectures and videos. It is about lack of time to discuss all what I want to discuss, to think about all this materials we get. Actually, I don’t want to sit at Coursera forums through all day. So I would like to have less materials for each week do discuss them deeper.

Studying Aboriginal Worldviews and Education was very productive for me, and I got some interesting ideas. Maybe I will write some of Activities this week, even they wouldn’t be counted for my grade already.

via WordPress http://7yukari7.wordpress.com/2013/03/25/aboriginal-worldviews-and-education-2/

Aboriginal Worldviews and Education: 1st Assignment

The objective of the 1st assignment was “Write a short (maximum 250 words) ethnographic description of your chosen place. Using the ethnographic voice, describe your familiar place as though you are seeing it as an outsider for the first time. Your description should insightfully illuminate the cultural worldview operating implicitly in your familiar place”.

I chose library, because this is a place I visit most often. Here is a longer version of my text written for this assignment:

The library

The library is a place where people can get books for free for certain time, usually for an month. To use this opportunity people need to register at the library first and get an library ticket.

The library is a very quiet place, or at least people try to make it quiet. Often a voice of a librarian can be heard: “Please switch your mobile phone off!” or “Please speak with friends somewhere else”. The library can be divided in two zones – “silent” and “not silent”. To “silent” zone belong reading halls and catalogues, where people can get a rebuke even for whispering something to a friend who sits near. “Not silent” zone are lobbies, corridors between “silent” places, checkrooms. So when one gets for example a phone call, he or she needs to first leave “silent” zone and only then answer.

The behavior of visitors can be different. Some people walk slowly from one bookshelf to another looking at the books and searching something interesting. Other tend to visit some specific groups of bookshelves, for example, with new books, with magazines of current year or with light reading books. Some people know what they want, so they just order a desired book, get it and go away.

Although some people visit a library alone, many groups of people, especially students, can be seen there. They come together to discuss something related to reading and study process, but also some other things. Sometimes (and not rare) “we will go to a library” sounds like “we will go to a cinema”, because both means to do something together, in a group, and to combine some useful and purposeful activity (reading, watching movie) with chatting and socializing. Such group visits to a library are typical mostly for students. Elder people usually come alone.

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AWE MOOC Week 1 Activity: Meaningful Place

One of the tasks of Week 1 at Aboriginal Worldview and Education MOOC is to describe own meaningful place. Here is what I wrote.

I cannot say that there is a place now, that I visit regularly and feel connected to. I have irrational feelings related to certain districts of areas of my hometown, and I also spend much time in libraries and like them very much. But the story of meaningful place is something different.

As I was child I visited my great grandmother every summer. She lived in another country (I live in Russia, and she was in Lithuania) in a small resort city. I can say that the city in whole, the image of a city in my memory is a meaningful place for me. I felt it again few months ago, when I was browsing Google Maps and found this city. I haven’t been there already for many years since my great grandmother has gone to a better world, but I still remember, where which tree was, and where I liked to walk, etc.

And I can also mention certain places in this city, that are even more meaningful for me. Sometimes (and not rare) I see this city in my dreams, and there are some key places, that appear more often. The playground. The tree near the house that was the common place for my games with friends and was everything from house to spaceship. A foot-path through the forest. An old log not far from the path that has the form of a wolf and was also my favorite place. A silent lake. A small river with an cascade. Our dacha and all this suburb area, that we visited nearly every day. I see now, that this list can be longer – there are so many things to mention. So I will stop and say, that the city of summers of my childhood is my meaningful place. Many very important stories of my life started there. I have a dream to visit this city maybe when I will be 30 years old… but I also have the fear that this can destroy the image of this city I have now in my memory.

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#EDCMOOC: My digital artifact

I started to make my digital artifact already at first week of the course. I made a short presentation about technology that was included in final work as “Part I”. “Part II” was made during the last week of the course. So I apologize for some stylish diversity of this presentation. Illustrations for Part I (Technology) are my own, illustrations for Part II (Human) was found in the web (their sources are mentioned near each picture).

Maybe you will like to toggle fullscreen mode on, because there are much text at certain slides.

I hope you will like it. I will be also very glad to receive your comments about this presentation.

via WordPress http://7yukari7.wordpress.com/2013/02/27/edcmooc-my-digital-artifact/

Aboriginal Worldviews and Education

Aboriginal Worldviews and Education course starts today at Coursera. It will be not very long (4 Weeks), so it’s just an introduction, but I hope it will be very productive for me. I note that the focus of my attention moves from studying different disciplines to the process of education itself. Aboriginal worldviews are also very interesting for me. Earlier I studied something to this topics during “Listening to World Music” Coursera course. I’ve also studied basic course of Folkloristic in the University. My current area of study isn’t directly connected to this discipline, but it still remains interesting and important for me.

It’s nice that submission period of the first assignment starts at the same day, when submission period of the final work for EDCMOOC ends

via WordPress http://7yukari7.wordpress.com/2013/02/25/aboriginal-worldviews-and-education/

#EDCMOOC : tablet PC vs. handwriting

I think, tablet PC will never replace pen and paper, especially at school.

Because if you sit in the class at the boring lesson (and even in the best school the lesson can be boring), you could never take a page from your tablet PC, make a paper plane and throw it in the window (or in your classmate ).

via WordPress http://7yukari7.wordpress.com/2013/02/18/edcmooc-tablet-pc-vs-handwriting/

#EDCMOOC: How e-learning affects the process of reading

As we can see on the example of this course and other MOOC, the proportion of visual and textual content is different, than in "traditional" education. We need to deal with videos, pictures, collages, presentations etc., and they aren't just illustrations to text - they have their own role in education process.

In EDC MOOC we also have to read some text - some articles about technology and education. Most of them are represeted as html pages, not pdf files (which I personally would prefer). I have an idea, that the process of reading articles in this form slightly differs from the preocess of reading a common book or magazine.

1. Scrolling up and down vs. turning pages over. Even when I read something important (not news or somebody's blog, but something for long reading), I prefer to download  the text to my e-reader (where I can read from page to page) or even print it on paper. It seems to me, that when I scroll down, I lose a focus and spend a couple of seconds to find a place where I stopped)
2. Making notes. Some text are worth active reading. You make notes, underline interesting places, or use highlighter, draw arrows linking ideas or concepts etc. (Maybe you know a good tool that allows to do such things in a browser? It would be nice to use it). Actually, when working on my degree paper, I bought a graphic tablet just for this purpose - to make free handwritten notes on very big anount of pdf books I need to work through. I see that technology can give new opportunities of making such notes (with certain advantages like using hypertext and links between notes), but hadn't find an appropriate tool yet.
3. Non-verbal information. Even if the books contains just plain text, there are also other layers of information. I've read one article that shows, for example, that Comic Sans is better to use in textbooks for primary schools than Times New Roman, because is easier to read. I know also that some authors of fictional or phylosphycal works insisted that their books shoud be reprinted with exact font, spacing, division to pages etc. Because such things also affect reception of the book. In most cases when you read something at web-page, this layer of information is lost (especially if you don't have an AdBlock or similar app). The text is more flexible, but at the same time it loses partially its structure. And that's why I prefer PDF - it keeps all this features as it was intended by author. 

What do you think? How the process of reading will change when people move more and more to reading web-pages and e-books from usual paper books and magazines? Will this changes affect the effectiveness of learning and of reading in general?

#EDCMOOC Some practical examples of problems in educational system

I work as private tutor in Russia, and I would like to give two examples, wchich, I think, show, what is wrong with our current educational system. Just particular observations, but I think, they are typical.

First: In most cases I visit my pupils at their homes. When I come a bit late, for example 5 minutes later, it's difficult to tell my 10-years-old pupil that we will than finish our lesson 5 minutes later too. So it is not about "spend some time to get some knowledge", it is like "finish this lesson as soon as we can, and go to more interesting things". (Actually, I put much effort to make a lesson interesting, but I don't have much success till now). I think this comes from typical 45-minutes-long school lessons, when all pupils work regardless their own productive work periods etc. They are used to work just when they have to work, and then throw this away from their mind.
Actually, students or school pupils of last year of education who prepapre to exams think already a bit different. They know what they need and why, so it is already not a problem to make a lesson a bit longer. But the problem still remains: In this year, from the 15 first-year university students I asked (I took part at  the exam as professor's assistant), only three have read something behind the basic textbooks. They just do their task from point A to point B and nothing more. 

Second. The same 10-years-old pupil from the example above asked me: "When I asked you, what grade will I get, why do you say "4", not "5"?" Actually, I didn't think about this problem when I gave the answer, I just said fairly what I think. But for the pupil a dream about getting "very good" (5 in our system) grade was more important than real information about her knowledge and what she do to improve it. So here is the problem: Pupils and student (and their parents too) worry about grades more than about getting real useful knowledge.

I think such problems cannot be solved without deep reorganization of educational system, and modern technologies give useful tools for than - we shoul only use them properly.