Learning4Content/Workshops/eL4C42/Introductions

= Introductions =  Dear Friends, You are very welcome to this eL4C42 Online workshop. Patricia, Nellie Deutsch and me are your facilitators and WE will help you in developing your page. Enjoy this workshop. If, while introducing yourself on this page or while adding information to your page, you face any problem, please, do not hesitate to ask for help. You can leave a message on Patricia's page or Nellie Deutsch’s page or my page. Warm Wishes.--Ramesh Sharma 19:38, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Johnson Opigo
Hi Everyone!

I am sorry to report late to class! I am an instructor in Web Design and Management, lately focusing on Web 2.0 tools for collaborative purposes. This course will surely afford me the opportunity to try my hands on Wiki Educator one of the heavyweights of Web 2.0. It promises to be exciting so, I am happy. Although it looks all too bewildering to me, I know that in the end I will catch up.

Best regards to the class!

Hassan Hamadu
Hello everyone,

Better late than never! I got most of the messages as spam and just recovered them. I am Hassan Hamadu a trainer (ICT) and an IT Manager. I am also into Rural Development project coordination. I am very happy to be a part of this workshop and just hope I have not missed so much.

Best Regards to everyone,


 * Dear Hassan, Welcome to Wikieducator. We are only on Day 4 today, and you will still have time to catch up as the first couple of days are not that time-consuming. Follow the instructions on the main workshop home page where they are posted day by day, and you should be fine. We recommend that you bookmark the workshop home page, so you have easy access to all information. Instructions will also reach you via the WikiEducator Moodle by email directly, just to ensure you receive them. Should you have questions, you can post your questions under Wiki Discussions off of the main workshop page. If you browse through the various tabs, you will find everything very straight forward. If not, don't feel shy to ask us, this is what we are here for and don't forget, all of us have started just like you, so no need to feel embarrassed if things are not clear. Warm wishes and welcome again, --Patricia Schlicht 16:13, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear Hassan, Welcome to Wikieducator. We are only on Day 4 today, and you will still have time to catch up as the first couple of days are not that time-consuming. Follow the instructions on the main workshop home page where they are posted day by day, and you should be fine. We recommend that you bookmark the workshop home page, so you have easy access to all information. Instructions will also reach you via the WikiEducator Moodle by email directly, just to ensure you receive them. Should you have questions, you can post your questions under Wiki Discussions off of the main workshop page. If you browse through the various tabs, you will find everything very straight forward. If not, don't feel shy to ask us, this is what we are here for and don't forget, all of us have started just like you, so no need to feel embarrassed if things are not clear. Warm wishes and welcome again, --Patricia Schlicht 16:13, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Anh Pham
Hello everyone. I am Anh Pham, a PhD student at School of Language Studies, Massey University, New Zealand. Before I came to NZ to do my PhD, I was a lecturer of English at Hue University College of Foreign Languages, Vietnam. My PhD is of Applied Linguistcs, focuses on Wikipedia practice and L2 self in the Vietnamese tertiary context in particular. I was introduced to this workshop by my supervisor, who recommends me to get to know more about Wiki practice, and generally the Wikis environment. I also wish to get informed about how people employ wikis in educational settings and second language teaching and learning settings particularly, and what people have studied about Wiki practice in second language education. I am aware that this workshop will not be a treat for my hunger of knowledge, but surely it will be a great source of inspiration.

A big thank you is dedicated to the workshop organizers and WikiEducator founders, who are inevitably endevouring to make a real difference in the e-world of knowledge.

Warm greetings to all of you.


 * Welcome Anh, Very happy to see a representative of Vietnam in our group, so a warm welcome to WikiEducator. Feel free to jump right in and ask as many questions as you need to. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 22:04, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Patricia Schlicht
I have been working with Dr. Wayne Mackintosh, the founder of WikiEducator since the get go of the initiative, in May of 2006. I have since then gradually increased my understanding, skills and involvement in Open Education and the use of and integration of open source software. It has been a privilege to see how one country after another has made use of this technology to make a difference in their own environment. WikiEducator has become the most exciting experience of my professional career. I am passionate about learning. I actively facilitate online workshops on WikiEducator as community volunteer in my spare time, in an attempt to build capacity for WikiEducator around the globe. I am interested in social networking, culture/anthropology, open and distance learning/eLearning, community and capacity building. I am a philanthropist. Feel free to [mailto:patricia@oerfoundation.org email me]. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 21:55, 29 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Hello Patricia. It's an honor to be co-facilitating with you once again. --Dr. Nellie Deutsch 21:52, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear Patricia:Its really exciting to read about all your great passions! With much more people like you our world would be Paradise! Let's work together! --Zapoteco 23:16, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear Alvaro, you make me blush (smile!) Thank you! Looking forward to our collaboration. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 22:05, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Ramesh Sharma
Greetings to all of you. I am Dr. Ramesh Sharma. I am working as Director, Distance Education, Institute of Distance and Continuing Education, University of Guyana, Georgetown, Guyana (South America). I have found WikiEducator very interesting and useful in building online communities and an excellent learning platform. I have leaned many things by collaborating with friends from all over the globe through WikiEducator. You can contact me through [mailto:ramesh@oerfoundation.org my email]. With best wishes, --Ramesh 13:02, 4 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi Ramesh, thanks for being here and such a great support system. Much appreciate it. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:22, 25 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi Ramesh. It's a pleasure to be co-facilitating with you once again. --Dr. Nellie Deutsch 21:53, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Hi Ramesh! It's a real pleasure to hear about you again, i feel like meeting old friends again. Thanks.--Zapoteco 23:01, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Dr. Nellie Deutsch
It is an honor to be part of this wonderful workshop. My name is Nellie (Muller) Deutsch. I am passionate about learning and consider myself a lifelong learner. I have a Doctor of Education in educational leadership specializing in curriculum and instruction and an MA in education specializing in curriculum and technology. I researched instructor experiences with implementing technology in blended learning courses in higher education around the world for my doctoral dissertation. For my MA, I conducted an Action Research Project (ARP) on ESL/EFL Students Lack the Skills to Cope with Reading Comprehension Tests. The dissertation is available on ProQuest. I have been teaching English as a foreign language for over 30 years. I have been integrating technology into the ESL/EFL classroom since the 1990s. I have been involved in international collaborative projects and WebQuests. I facilitate online and face-to-face workshops on how to integrate technology into the classroom. In addition I conduct online workshops on mindfulness meditation practice, Professional Electronic Portfolios (PEP), WebQuests for Teachers (WQ4ALL), Moodle for Teachers (M4T), storytelling and cultures, integration of technology and web 2.0 tools and Moodle Workshops as well as blended online learning (BOL) courses via WiZiQ and Integrating Technology for Active Lifelong Learning (IT4ALL) at IT4ALL Moodle. In my spare time, I mentor educators on how to integrate web 2.0 tools for instruction and learning. I would like to see e-learning available and free worldwide.


 * Welcome Nellie. It is nice to have another experienced educator in our team. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 21:46, 25 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you, Patricia.
 * Thanks Nelly for your nice greeting! I just reviewed your WebQuests and I love the activities. I am going to introduce them to some of them. I love all the loving detail you worked in each activity! Thanks for sharing!

Álvaro Ricárdez
It's a pleasure to say hi to everybody! I am an TEFL Mexican junior high school teacher who has been using wikis in his classes. I have found wikis a very easy and useful tool to post and share works, to be in touch with my students and to learn socially! My young students love to see their work on line and they are very proud of it! This way I can motivate them to learn more and to feel that even at their young age, they can become meaningful participants in their world! The wiki concept opens a wide door to the whole globe!

Right now I'm trying to learn more, to feel confident doing wikis and to introduce this technology to my fellow teachers. This is the main reason I registered for this shop! I'm sure there is still a wide field of applications for wikis. Not only as learning tools, but also as collaborative tools. Please, feel free to contact me through [mailto:alvaroric@hotmail.com my email];. With my best wishes to you all!--Zapoteco 23:45, 23 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Dear Alvaro, The pleasure is all ours. Great to have you with us again. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:23, 25 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Kia Ora Álvaro What an inspiration you have become to me. (I am overwhelmed how the whole community is inspirational including our facilitators) You kind communications in this workshop and User page just beams out so much outstanding positive energy. It is amazing to think this is how wiki works - that we get the opportunity to meet though our sharing such wonderful people - to become more aware of how wonderful all of our WikiNeighbours are and to refresh our faith in humanity's potential.--Zan 22:08, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Zan Iqbal
Peace and Greetings Everyone, Tēnā Koutou Katoa, (from a school teacher living in Howick, Auckland, New Zealand)

Am so happy to be part of this workshop. Love computing. Love the transparency currently being introduced more so all around the world. Believe in sharing knowledge - freely. Newton saw how open Kepler was in publishing his works and did likewise. The world advances with sharing. We all hold pieces of a beautiful jigsaw and when we share our pieces all behold a fuller picture. Teaching (in schools) uses up a good portion of the day. We as teachers are so often busy lesson planning, evaluating etc that our own self-enrichment and self-professional development may lag unintentionally. When wiki started I didn't contribute not knowing the fundamentals but now here through this workshop the opportunity to learn presents itself. A chance to grow and share. This workshop is a blessed opportunity too good to ignore and I thank all who have helped create this workshop. --Zan 11:09, 25 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Dear Zan. This is what we like to see, you can't make ANY mistake, should you really make one, that can't be reverted, so feel free to jump in and try out. You also have the "show preview" function to see how what you entered will look it. If it is not what you had in mind, don't save your input, because to have it appear on your user page, you will have to SAVE ALL input, when you are done. Don't hesitate us to ask questions, we are here to help you. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:25, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Welcome Zan. I'm looking forward to collaborating with you on WikiEducator. --Dr. Nellie Deutsch 21:50, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear Zan: I love your introduction, so full of passion and optimism. I'm coming from one of the poorest states in Mexico, from a community centered culture, and I think that in sharing we gain not only knowledge but harmony and happiness too! It's great to have you here!--Zapoteco 23:40, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear Zan, i see you have jumped right in and that is great. Enjoy the learning curve, it is through the challenges that we grow. Warm wishes,--Patricia Schlicht 22:08, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Sylvia Riessner
Hi everyone. I've explored Wikieducator before as a student in an open learning course but it will be interesting to learn how to become a participant and member of the Wikieducator community of educators. I live in the Yukon in the north of Canada and I work for our local college as an instructor of instructors (primarily). I am interested in the development of online learning communities and in the concept and values inherent in open learning initiatives. Feel free to [mailto:Yukonsyl@gmail.com email me]. Cheers --Sylvia Riessner


 * Dear Sylvia, I remember you from your name from your last involvement in WikiEducator, so it is really good that you would like to become an active member, a decision that you will not regret. Welcome on aboard again. We are here to help, so feel free to ask questions, which you can post under the Wiki Discussions in the appropriate place on the main workshop page. The link to the course home page is on your user page. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:28, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Hello Sylvia. Great to have you among us as a member of WikiEducator. --Dr. Nellie Deutsch 21:49, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Satendra Singh


Dear All, I am Dr Satendra Singh, Assistant Professor of Physiology and faculty at Medical Education Unit, University College of Medical Sciences, University of Delhi, India. I have attended CRSTE Cyberconference earlier this year and very much involved into medical education. With regards


 * Dear Satendra, Welcome on board, it to great to have you with us. Hope you will find this learning opportunity as wonderful and exciting a journey than we find it. Feel free to ask as many questions as you need to. We are here to help you. Welcome again. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:29, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Welcome to WikiEducator and L4C42, Satendra. Let me know how I can be of help. --Dr. Nellie Deutsch 21:46, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Fabián Gatti
Hi everyone. I am a Spanish Literature Professor and e-Learning consultant at Uruguay. I think building a strong, worldwide e-learning community it's a great way to cope with our educational problems no matter where you are from. This is my first time in WikiEducator so I'm just getting in touch with the enviroment. It's been a while since the last time I wrote in english so please be patient! Feel free to contact me on [mailto:gattifabian@gmail.com gattifabian@gmail.com].


 * Dear Fabian, Welcome to Wikieducator. It is good to see you here. I am sure you are going to meet many like-minded educators from around the world in this workshop, so enjoy the learning curve and your new Wiki family you are now becomng part of. Feel free to ask questiona you might have. Nellie Deutsch, Ramesh Sharma and I are here to help you. Please go to the getting started instructions and register your wikieducator account with the same name you used to register in the workshop, your full name. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 19:26, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Great to see you among the participants, Fabian. Let me know how I can be of help. --Dr. Nellie Deutsch 21:45, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * ¡Hola Fabián! Me parece que no escribes nada mal el inglés, creo que lo recuerdas perfectamente. Es un placer tener a un profesor de literatura en Wikieducator. Yo enseño inglés en el sur de México y estoy tomando una licenciatura en línea, en la UNAM (Universidad Nacional Aurtónoma de México), para enseñar español a extranjeros. Me gusta leer y mis clases de literatura hispanoamericana fueron apasionantes. Saludos cordiales. Álvaro. --Zapoteco 23:47, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Wayne Mackintosh
Hi Everyone -- I'm not officially part of this workshop :-(, but will pop in and see how you are all progressing and leave a few comments. With apology -- I'm rather busy managing our recruitment and donation drive at the moment.

I had the privilege of starting the WikiEducator project in February 2006 from a small desktop server based at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. Today WikiEducator is one of the world's fastest growing and most productive wikis in the formal education sector. It's great to see teachers around the world collaborating and sharing knowledge in this way. I have to say that WikiEducator has been the most rewarding project of my professional career as educator. If you want to find out a little more about my work in WikiEducator, feel free to visit my userpage. Recently, Otago Daily Times has published a short summary of WikiEducator. Welcome to our family and I'll see you in the wiki. Wayne Mackintosh 00:35, 26 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi Wayne, thanks for coming in, good to have you with us. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:36, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Kia ora Wayne - It is so great to see the kiwi initiative in action. Many thanks for your vision. It is wonderful to think that a founder is kind enough to find opportunity to encourage all who follow on, independent of how new or established they are. Thanks for your example and for creating this fascinating pathway of sharing.--Zan 21:50, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Jacque Allen
Hi, my name is Jacque Allen and I am the E-Learning Facilitator at Saint Kentigern College, in Auckland, New Zealand. I am a new user to Wikieducator and am using this experience to dive right in. I am looking forward to the stimulation in relation to teaching and learning practise from around the world.


 * Dear Jacque, You are being among great company as New Zealand is currently building a large Teacher Network with the help of the Ministry of Education. Check out wikiEducator's host, the Open Education Resource Foundation under OER NZ. Warm wishes --Patricia Schlicht 16:38, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Kia ora Jacque, I am literally just down the road from you - in Howick and learning at the same time with you in this current e-learn workshop. It's neat to think that this experience is so international and also so local too. Shine on --Zan 21:30, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Kathleen Texeira
Hi,

My name is Kathleen Texeira.I am an administrator in a rural school in central Trinidad.I am excited to be part of this workshop. I want to learn more about wikis because I would like to introduce it in the classroom to motivate our students in Creative Writing.I am grateful to the organisers of this workshop for allowing us this opportunity to be part of this exercise. I know that I will enjoy the experience.


 * A warm welcome, Kathleen. You are among many Trinidadians who have joined WikiEducator which includes a large community of WikiEducators among the Ministry of Education and others. Welcome aboard. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 16:41, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Faye Bascom
Hello All. I'm Faye Bascom from The Bahamas. I am currently involved in a project designed to strengthen the integration of ICTs in teaching and learning across schools in The Bahamas. Taking advantage of forums like this could provide needed tools to assist us in rolling out our e-Strategy so I am looking forward to learning as I interact with all during this workshop. Thanks for making it available.


 * Dear Faye, it never stops to amaze me in what degrees of separation we move, just to meet each other again in a different setting. You and I go back a long time during our TVET involvements and see where we are now. Great to see you here. Welcome aboard. Feel free to ask any questions you might have, we are here to help. Warm wishes --Patricia Schlicht 16:44, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks Dr. Sharma!


 * Patricia you are correct, it's been about 10 yrs! Thanks for the warm welcome
 * The pleasure is all mine, Faye. Greetings --Patricia Schlicht 23:16, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Brendan Smith
Hello to everyone around the world. I joined the previous workshop and I enjoyed it so much I'm back for more. The enjoyment comes from a sense of achievement in completing the set tasks, no matter how challenging they are in trying to come to terms with this wiki platform. Also, this time I want to work more with the HTML (wikitext) to become more familiar with how to present information in a creative way. This time, too, I intend to read the instructions a little more closely. --B J Smith 07:18, 26 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Dear Brendan, I am really glad you enjoyed the last workshop, which indeed was quite an experience. You were witness to experience the power of our wonderful community first-hand. Come back as many times as you need to, because the wonderful thing about this initiative is, not only is it free but you many people to help you along. Welcome again. Warm wishes --Patricia Schlicht 16:46, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Francis Glasgow
Hello Everyone, I am Francis Glasgow. I work with the Institute of Distance &amp; Continuing Education, University of Guyana.I signed up for two previous wikis but was never able to participate. I hope that I will be able to do so on my third attempt.
 * Dear Francis. I am very glad to see that you were intrigued enough to come back because believe me, this is a really great learning opportunity that will get your mind going as it opens up a new way of looking at what's available and how to do things in your own environment. Enjoy the learning curse. We are here to help and you are lucky since you have an avid WikiEducator right next to you, Dr. Ramesh Sharma. Warm wishes--Patricia Schlicht 23:14, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Liz Levey
Hello everyone:

I am Liz Levey and am participating in this workshop as a senior advisor to the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. I've added some information about who I am in the "Profiles" section. I told Wayne and Patricia in advance that I would not create an OER. Actually, I would like to learn from your experiences with WikiEducator and other ways you have explored to create educational content. I'm interested in ease-of-use, bandwidth constraints, why you signed up, what you will do with the educational materials you create, etc. For example--does your school allow you to use the OER you create in your classroom? Does your school administration support your efforts? What about other teachers? Are you using OERs from other sources and, if so, how do you evaluate quality? For an introduction, I've spent all of my time asking questions, so I'll stop here. But I am very much looking forward to hearing from you, sharing information with you, and to learning from your experience. Regards, Liz


 * Dear Liz, Welcome to WikiEducator. While we of course welcome a learning contract contribution of open ontent in exchange for this free training workshop, we won't hold you to it and in your particiular case we are dealing with a different scenario and background. I hope you will find this training workshop easy to follow once you have familiarised yourself with where things are. I am glad to see, you were able to make your way to the Introductions, and have asked very important questions, so thank you for this. We may have to look for another place of trying to answers all the questions though. You might want to sign up for the main wikieducator mailing list on the main page and I can also sign you up for the WikiEducator Teacher Collaboration portal as it comes with invitation, while the first one you can sign up for directly. It is on both those discussion lists, you could post this question, if you would like.

Welcome again, Warm wishes, --Patricia Schlicht 16:22, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

S. Raja Rao
Hello Friends,

I am happy to join again for eL4C42 Workshop. I was away for couple of days. Hope to catch up with the missed lessons. I am very much benefited by the earlier workshop. Let us hope I learn some new things during this workshop also. I am very much benefited by the guidance of Facilitators. With warm regards to all. raja rao.


 * Dear Raja Rao, glad to see you here again. Warm wishes,--Patricia Schlicht 23:12, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Gillian Skyrme
I am at Massey University in New Zealand. I have joined because I intend to ask the tutors who work on my paper teaching academic writing in English to speakers of other languages to use wikis with the students. Although I use web-based platforms in the distance learning which forms an important proportion of my teaching, and do so competently and even innovatively (hugely assisted by the technical help I have here), I am not a natural inhabitor of the web, and for me 'fun' and 'the internet' are not collocations at all. Pages with little blue hyperlinks make my heart sink. I am trying to suppress this and hook into the joy that they bring other people.

I am puzzled and frustrated by the fact that my introduction appears as a subheading to that or S. Raja Rao, which is not my intention, but I can't find any way of making it my own as everybody else has managed to do.

Yasoda Sriwardana
Hello everyone,

I am a Textiles engineer from Sri Lanka, currently working as a Finance professional. I registered early, but today is my first day on wiki educator. I am Hope to catch up on what I missed soon. It feels great to have finally started. Regards to all!