Week 10: Time to say "good bye"

Week 10 was of 5 days. We submitted our projects and got feedback from our instructor. My project was about how JiTT and Flipped Classroom (FC) could be used to minimize the dependency on face to face classroom. The target behind this project was the present scenario of Bangladesh where students had to miss classes due to blockade and strikes. So, I tried to come up with a solution where students could learn without having f2f class with their teachers.

In the online discussion, we discussed our present use of technology and how we would use it in future. I went through 3 tiers of technology use created by State of Washington. As per tiers, i belong to tier 2 for my present use of technology. However, I planning to move into tier 3. for that purpose, I have a plan to engage my students into podcasting. 

Week 7: Learner autonomy and technology

I learned more about learners autonomy (LA) in week 7 and LA can be enhanced in a low-resourced classroom. I learned two articles about LA. I also set an ABCD objective for one computer classroom that will ensure LA. Choosing project partner was another agenda of this week. I an going to share my project with Neary. We will provide feedback to each other to progress with our work. Hope the nest week will much more exciting.

Week 6: Interactive teaching

In this week, I learned another new term "JiTT" (Just in Time Teaching). To make students engaged, JiTT can be very effective since the students are supposed read first and then they come to the class. I really appreciate JiTT because of its simplicity and effectiveness.

The discussion topic of week 6 was about how technology can be used to teach a large class. I went through the valuable comments of my colleagues and and learned about different use of some common e-tools in the classroom.

Power point slide is a very common tool used in classroom. However, using slides might be boring if they are not interactive. This week I tried to make interactive power point slides for my class using blank slides and link. I used the slides in my class and my students gave positive feedback.

Now I am looking forward to Week 7 to come across something new again.

Week 5: PBL and Alternative assessment

I was familiar with PBL and different types of rubrics but I first heard about Alternative Assessment in Week 5. I prepared a Holistic rubric for the projects of Materials design. The students of this course are engaged in PBL. They will learn while doing their project. We have an online discussion forum where students post their problems and help each other giving suggestions. Thus technology is incorporated in PBL. However, online discussion are not lively like their classroom discussion. 

Learning of Week 4

Week 4 was comparatively relaxing for me. The main task was to analyze some websites for teaching reading, writing, vocabulary and grammar. While doing that, I came across many interesting sites that are not only good for teachers but also for students' self learning. I also explore some other posted by other students and found some exciting materials.

I gave a thought to my final project and decided what and how I am going to proceed with my works. I think it will be easier for me now to concentrate on my project. 

Week 3: Exploring other projects

Week 3 was all about exploring previous projects. I went through some of the other students' projects that they did last time. Among them, I liked the projects of Phyak's done in Tribhuvan University, Nepal. He taught research skill and academic writing skill to his Masters students.

Besides, I also explore a social bookmarking site - delicious.com. I had no idea of social bookmarking site before exploring this site. I found this site to be very user friendly. It is a great platform to share my favourite links with others. Findings important sites has become easier now since I can save all of them in delicious.com. 

Learning of Week 2

         Week 2 was exciting for me for many reasons. First of all, the whole week was off because of Durga Puja and Eid. So, everyone in Bangladesh was in a festive mood. However, in terms of teaching and learning, the week was also exciting. 

         The concept of writing an ABCD objective was really interesting to me. Writing an objective was nothing new to me since I have to do it very often for my classes but the term ABCD was new to me. I think my students are also going to like this because it is much more easier to write the objective following the rule of ABCD. 

         Apart from Google, yahoo and Wikipedia, I have never tried any other search engines. But, in this week, I learned about a lot of search engines. Though I am not very happy with their search results, I am still exploring them to know more details. However, I have applied the web searching task into my class but in a different way. My students searched for different websites of language learning whereas I looked to different search engines. During the vacation, my students did this task online and they really enjoyed it.

Web Searching for English Language Materials

          Last Week I asked my students of Materials Designing course to select 5 websites for English Language learning and teaching. But, the condition was that they cannot select the same website. Everyone had to chose 5 unique websites. We have a group in Facebook where the students posted the websites they selected. It was students responsibility to check the previous posts before selecting websites to make sure that there was no similar websites.
           I have 18 students in this course and all of them came up with (18X5) 90 unique websites for English language learning and teaching. Later, they evaluated those web based materials in terms of their usability in Bangladeshi context.
         My students really enjoyed the task and I could realize that from their enthusiasm. Once they finished their task, they said that it looked like a small database of web based English language materials. The best part of this database is that the pros and cons of each website is mentioned here. So, someone can easily look at it and understand which website would suit his/her purpose.