Participant intros
Hello. Any introductions and get-to-know-yous from participants? Please reply to this message
Hello my name is Leigh and I'm an educational developer for Otago Polytechnic. I try to keep up with developments in the field of education, tending to focus on the use of the Internet. I sometimes facilitate this course for Otago Polytechnic. I keep a professional blog at http://learnonline.wordpress.com which gets postings on all manor of things to do with educational development. My email is: leighblackallATgmailDOTcom. More info about me can be found by clicking my name in the little grey box below:
Hi, My name is Megan and I lecture in Nutrition at the Institute of Sport and Adventure and in the School of Midwifery. As a lot of my coursei n Midwifery is taught by online methods I have decided that this course will be of great help to me. I am looking forward to learning more about methods to enhance e-learning and flexible learning. I have now created my own blog - which was easier than I thought it would be. The address is http://megansmutterings.blogspot.com/
Hi
Raewyn Lesa here from the nursing school. This is all pretty new to me. I have 4 children and the oldest is 16 so between them all and there Dad I'm always the last to get on the computer. I've sneaked on before they get home from school. I'm planning to try and set up my blog shortly (if I don't get kicked off)Hubby and oldest son are off to England shortly so I'll have to make the most of computer time. I'm looking forward to expanding my knowledge over the next few months...I have really noticed lately how lectures don't always get the message across clearly, no matter how good you try and make it!I teach and coordinate in 2nd year courses and spend a reasonablr amount of time in the hospital setting doing clinical.
Hey that wasn't too hard its Raewyn again, haven't been chucked off computer yet. Anyway my blogg address is http://raewynbusymumof4.blogspot.com/
Hi, Steve Ellwood here I'm a Cookery Lecturer on the level 4 programe up @ Tennyson Street. We have various platforms we are delivering our E-learning from, Blackboard being the main site for all of our theory and communication with our enrolled students, our blog http://otagocookeryl4.blogspot.com/ and YouTube, as our video platform http://www.youtube.com/ We are also starting to gather information from students with I-pods which we have loaded with their assessment instructional videos and pictures. This is to see if in the future we could offer such a service for distance learners with the intent of having them come in every few weeks to be assessed in the kitchens. We still can't get away from tasting the food, nor should we try. I'm looking forward to reading everyone else's idea's on flexible learning have have no dought it will help us in improving the service we provide. Cheers, Steve.
Back again, I,ve just set up another "BLOG" so I can keep track of this course. http://flexiblefrying.blogspot.com/ Flexible Frying As i've got another 20 credits in my GCTLT this year I think I'll be using a few BLOGS to keep track of everything.
Good work Steve getting your intro up and your blog up and running. My mouth is watering with the lovely pics of food. Not fair! The cookery blog is just great and I can see I will be spending many a happy hour watching food. I am interested in how you are gathering information from students and would love to hear more. Do they have to provide an ipod or is this provided? Bronwyn
Thanks Bronwyn, We are gathering info (evidence if you like) in a video diary from our students, hopefully we could possibly use this in the future to get some funding to supply i-pods to our students, distance or not, as a means of demonstration. We aren't sure how to go about this properly yet, maybe you could suggest the right track to go down. They do provide their own i-pods or mp3/4s at the moment.
the video diary sounds very creative Steve . Is it like big-brother where they sit down at regular intervals and talk to the camera in a room? Maybe you could also record a focus group discussion about the experience at the end - either video or audio - using an independent interviewer. Someone not directly involved in the course who is good at extracting information and facilitating discussion. If you write this up it could form the basis for an external funding application 0 see AKO Aotearoa info below.
Otago Polytechnic has the new innovation fund ($5000) - the flexible learning development plan will help with this.
AKO Aotearoa is offering up to $10000 funding for innovative teaching and learning - and this would go a long way towards setting something up. You could run a research evaluation with another pilot group - supply ipods etc and use the funds for an external interviewer and researcher time. See: Wk 13: June 2-8: National and International support for flexible learning development.
Bronwyn
Hi, thank you very much for the info, we will be looking into that application straight away as we have just put together a distance package for Level 4, year One Part Time for a student. I've recorded what we have done on my blog and will be communicating with the student on a regular basis to see how he feels about the package.
Hi Steve Um yes YUM. I am interested in the sound of your information gathering project re improving on your service! Are publishing the info I'll visit your pages and ....watch that spot Susan
Hello all I am Bronwyn Hegarty and one of the facilitators. I am an educational developer in the Educational Development Centre here at Otago Polytechnic. I have been involved in flexible learning since my time in the School of Nursing (1993 to 2002) when I used to run a full day face-to-face bioscience course over a semester, plus an online version of the course. As well as that I have done the usual lectures and tutorials and computing training workshops. My background is in bioscience and zoology and nursing all of which have been very useful in my work at the polytechnic. Since 2002 I have been involved in facilitating online and blended courses in educational topics.
For fun when not teaching or helping people design and develop flexible courses or doing research, I love to go for long walks with my husband and the dogs....cats follwing at a distance. Our latest fad is to watch tv series on DVD, and we like to go to the movies and theatre and concerts. The highlight for us in March is going to be the Wellington Arts festival - Black Watch, Book of Longing and the Dentist's chair - and we get to go with our son who lives there. Then we are off to Womad in New Plymouth. The rest of the year I will be ensconced at home and finishing my Doctorate. I look forward to meeting more of you on here and on your blogs. My blog is up and running. Bronwyn
Morning all, I'm Cherry. I am an educational designer at the University of New England. I am currently working on two projects - teacher training via distance (using Sakai) and nurse education (using Blackboard).
We are considering structuring the nurse education program using case studies. I begin that project next week, so it will be very helpful to discuss this type of education and the use of wikis for the purpose.
I have been involved in online learning for about 15 years. I am a former primary school teacher who moved into technical education and am now in the university sector. I look forward to establishing a great working relationship with you all.
Cherry
hello cherry great to see your interest in this topic. I am looking forward to "talking" with our global participants and your perspectives will greatly enrich this course. Bronwyn
Hi cherry, I'm a midwifery educator so will be interested to hearing more about what you are up to: http://sarah-stewart.blogspot.com cheers Sarah
Carolyn Here. Hi all, I am just completing another course led by Bronwyn and Leigh. In that course we also had to create a blog so mine has been up and running for a wee while. I started it in September last year and it has become part of my life now. If you visit my blog you will see that I have a wee game I loaded on to the end of it, be warned it is addictive. Once you start it is hard to stop, well for me anyway. Apart from blogging and cruising the web I do enjoy crafty things, just starting to get into making jewelery and enjoy painting, (not really good at it though). I have had a go at spinning in the past and when I am old and grey and at home I plan to do more of that and weaving, maybe:)I want to take up golf and fishing I think. I like folk music and used to sing a bit, lucky Bronwyn going to Womad here is my blog Carolyn's blog Just started a blog for this course at wordpress called Fled: Flexible learning education design. Hope to connect with you all through that.
Phew, its great to have you in here Carolyn. Your enthusiasm and experience in these sort of courses will help us immensely.
You are right about the game! I've just had a go and it is hard to stop. Will have to make sure I don't spend time heaps of time on it!!!
great to have a Second Lifer in the course Carolyn. i look forward to hearing about your antics and plans for flexible learning. Bronwyn
Just edited the comment above to include my new wordpress blog which I have started particularly for this course,learning and reflections. My new blog is called Fled: Flexible learning education design good don't you think I think I will have a lot of fun with 'Fled'.
Hello everyone
My name is Sarah Stewart. Last year I did the 'Online learning communities' course so I am now familiar with blogs. In fact, I'd say it has become an obsession for me! Here is my blog: Sarah's Musings.
I am currently a PhD candidate at the Centre for Online Health, UQ, Brisbane. For my research, I developed an email mentoring system for nurses and allied health workers as a means to support professional development and life-long learning. Unfortunately, it has not worked very well at all. So I plan to use this course to explore how I could change the system I developed into a flexible system that would engage people more.
sorry to hear your initial research did not work out - often a pilot is like that and the same thing happened to me. It will still be excellent data for your final writeup. The research strategies I eventually ended up using for my main study were quite different to those in the pilot. I am looking forward to reading your thoughts around flexible learning on your blog. Bronwyn
Hi Leigh Bronwyn and others at the face to face first session today. Tracy here from Fashion - I am off to a fashion conference (IFFTI)in Melbourne tomm until next Tues so will have to set up my personal blog when I get back. Here is a hyperlink to the IFFTI website if ur interested in what I will be doing over the weekend. [1] We have two members of the fashion team presenting at the conference and we are lucky enough to be the only fashion school in NZ to be part of this international fashion tertiary organisation.Todays course intro was both informing and exciting - looking forward to learning lots and using it in my current practise. Cheers Tracy Kennedy
It was really good to meet you today Tracy, and to hear how your students are challenging you to change the way you are teaching. The conference looks like it will be very inspiring and I am looking forward to hearing about it when you return. I went to the Fashion show at the Railway station on Saturday night and was amazed by the clothes, the poise of the models, the pizzazz and the long, long walkway. It was great to see so much creativity. Bronwyn
Re: email group
Hello everyone, if you visit the course blog you will see the email group that was set up last year. May I suggest that we use that group rather than set up another one? cheers Sarah
Hi I'm Alli. Life beings at forty! It did for me. I have over twenty five years crime scene examination / forensic support experience. I'm currently a Senior Project Officer for NZ Police looking specifically at creating a world class forensic provision. Have been in NZ for over three years. Having worked for the same organisation in a similar role for twenty plus years I decided to develop my professional skills to open up other options. Started with a Diploma in Operational Management - University College Worcester UK Then caught the study bug - a Diploma in Management Studies again from Worcester. As my boss in UK did not support my study towards a Masters I resigned and came to NZ. Completed my MBA from University of Otago - 2006 Now because I'm reviewing training courses I have started a Graduate Certificate in Tertiary Learning and Teaching. There's so much out there to learn and I'm loving it. E-learning is very new to me but there must be others out there who can help!
I'm married with four 'imported' dogs and two locally acquired horses. I don't really teach although I did contribute to the Crime Scene Induction course at the Police college on Monday. To reach the project objective - training is the key. Due to NZ being geographically challenged (access to further professional development)I feel e-learning / flexible learning is the way forward. I am very excited about this course and the range of valuable contacts to 'poach with pride' from! I think I've set up a 'blog': http://allibarty.blogspot.com/ Cheers Alli
This is amazing and so many blog links already. I am impressed. it was really good to meet so many enthusiastic people today and hear about the areas you work in and the type of flexible learning you are already doing, and what you would like to do more of in the future. Already you have your own definitions of what flexible learning might be, and as you may have realised today, the ground is always shifting. I thought I had it sorted when I got to grips with Blackboard. Now I am venturing, like you into new territory. This year I am using WikiEducator for the online content for two courses (this one and a TANZ Grad Cert in elearning in which I teach) - it is the first time I have primarily used blogs for communication.
Those of you who got your blogs up so quickly have illustrated how easy it is to do. Well done. Now I am off to do some more reading of blogs. :) Bronwyn
G'day. I've been hanging around WikiEducator for a short while now and am very impressed with the activities here. I've decided to join in with this course for a number of reasons.
1. It looks interesting.
2. There seems to be some interesting people here
3. I might get to do more with my blog (http://vicariousconversations.com/blog)
No matter how hard I try, I don't seem to be able to develop my blogging 'voice' even though I've been blogging for years. Maybe through the interactions here and the prompts, I can finally get something going.
I'm a full time academic, so I don't know how much time I'll get to read everything, but hopefully, I'll keep up to date.
Alison
I'm very much like you Alison, I have been hanging around, but not getting involved. Now most definately is the time to do so. I am impressed by the wide spread participation and hope to meet lots of interesting people here. cherry
hello alison great to have you join us. I was unable to set up an RSS feed from your blog - are you able to add this feature? We are very lucky to have participants from around the world and this will give us a much broader perspective about flexible learning. Bronwyn
Hey Bronwyn, I *think* I've fixed the RSS feed on my blog and actually started to catch up. I've also set up a google alert for flexible learning, so I might be able to identify all the participants and slowly subscribe to their blogs.
Is there any communal page for blogs of people in this group? It might make it easier to identify each other. Hmm, can we bring in RSS to WikiEducator? I've got feeds going out, would be cool to see some coming in.
Alison
Hello all! My name is David and I'm a member of the Instructional Technology faculty at Utah State University. Like Leigh, I try very hard to keep up with what's going on in the practice of applying technology to solve educational problems. My main area of interest is increasing people's access to educational opportunity. I keep a blog at http://opencontent.org/blog/ and my email address is davidDOTwileyATgmailDOTcom.
G'day David,
I think you have an international technology conference in your neck of the woods. I read about it somewhere, thought how wonderful to be able to meet up with a few of these people, but alas, wrong timing for me. I am way down in Australia and will have little chance of travel except via this means.
hello David It is great to see you the originator of this type of flexible learning design join us. People may not be aware of the attribution we have made to David's work - at the bottom of the page. I am impressed by the global interest so far and looking forward to lots of stimulating interactions. Bronwyn
Hi all, My name is Penelope Kinney and I am at the School of Occupational Therapy. I have only very recently joined the team there. I've been here 5 weeks!!! Every thing is still a little confusing but I'm getting there. I am involved in lecturing in the degree programme and co-ordinating the postgraduate programme. I get to complete face to face teaching and working with our programmes which are 100% distance based. It gives me a real insight to different methods of delivery!!
I have come from a clincial background in Forensic Psychiatry. Its a specialist area of Mental Health. Have to admit its lovely not having to come to work through a series of air locks and jiggling keys!! Oh and being able just to pop out for a walk at lunch is a bonus too.
I've created my blog and all going well you can access it on http://otpenk.blogspot.com
I'm looking forward to meeting everyone over the next few months.
hi from Susan,
I enjoyed the discussion that flowed throughout the introductions from the meeting 6th March. I'm looking forward to exploring the application of flexible teaching of music and building some content and to peer to peer collaborating over the DFPL course. The first thing that occurs to me is to launch into a digital technical support network- that is once introductions are through. This will already happen via my posting blogs, reading yours and (even) posting comments which I realise is going to present quite a - challenge. http://susamellis.wordpress.com
Its early days - go for it -Thats in response to Sara suggesting the optional network of a google group.
hello susan great to see you on the go already. It is great to have so much interest in the course. We need to be careful that discussion on the blogs is not impaired due to having extra stuff to do on an email group. Perhaps this is a place for quick messages and alerting people to interesting stuff. My thoughts.
If everyone ticks the email alert box when they post a comment to someone's blog, they will start to see alerts coming into their email inbox when the person replies to the comment - then they can reply to this on the person's blog. If everyone makes an effort to watch each others' blogs we will soon get lively discussion going on the blogs. Bronwyn
Gooday Just to alert you of a change -I've just posted a weblog link to http://susamellis.wordpress.com.
Hi everyone, my name is Michelle, sorry that I missed the workshop yesterday. Leigh & Bronwyn, thanks for the wee tut this morning. I am now officially here. I have just set up my blog on the blogger http://nzbibi710.blogspot.com Hi Tracy, hi Ali, hi Penelope, glad that we are classmates agian!!
Hi everyone, My name is Katy Molloy and I work in the Design department at Otago Polytechnic. I am a Teaching and Research Assistant in Arts and Design papers, and a Lecturer. I consider myself computer literate, but this Wiki and blog thing is foreign to me. I'm sorry I missed the Introduction workshop, and hope to warm up to this digital environment soon! My blog is http://katymdesigning.blogspot.com/ Cheers
Hi Kate, I too am a newbie both as a teaching and research assistant at Edc Otago Polytechnic and at Web 2.0 blogging, wikieducator collaborating. There is always plenty of digital challenges. Although with practice and perseverence and time, I have learned to weblog theres been lots of points where I needed to ask for help. Susan
Hello,
My name is Fiona (aka Athena, my middle name) I have set up my blog at http://athena-odyssey.blogspot.com/ It was great to meet everyone at the face to face on Wednesday the 5th of March. I have been attempting to use a flexible delivery process in my teaching for a while now and have badly needed to up skill in this area. As I mentioned in the workshop, the school of occupational therapy is selling the bachelors course to Wintec in Hamilton and the staff (especially myself) need to learn to up skill on e-learning and flexible delivery asap. I am also very interested in the concept of sustainability and education and plan to do some research around this area. On a personal note, I am from Scotland, traveled out to New Zealand 12 years ago as a WWOOFER (http://www.wwoof.co.nz/ ) and ran out of petrol in Dunedin 11 years ago and met my husband Ben on Quarantine Island (Kamautaurua or St. Martin's island http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Martin_Island/Quarantine_Island ), had my daughter Zoe 7 years ago and youngest daughter Amy 5 years ago. Currently building a eco/sustainable house (completion date end of July) which has us mortgaged and me working now at full-time for the next 30 years! Plenty of time to learn new skills.
Hi Fiona - I am extremely interested in the integration of sustainability into the curriculum and am embarking on research in this area. In particular I will be looking at current practice/s and models within the NZ fashion industry and the implications for fashion education & educators. Havent had the chance to set up my blog yet but can keep u posted on progress - this is brand new research and I am a new researcher with limited hours so it will be slow progress. Will post this on ur blog too. Cheers Tracy
Hi Bronwyn,
Can you tell me how to delete duplicate post not an act of enthusiasm more of confusion...
Hi. I'm Kristen Bracey from Foundation Learning. I am informally enrolled on the course at this stage, to see if 'it's for me', and whether I have the time to manage the course work.
Hi all, sorry about the delay, but I am finally here... My name is Pete Douglas and I work for the New Zealand Fire Service as an operational fire fighter and on my days off I educate public education in fire safety for the Fire Service. I am also a national recruit instructor for our newly paid recruits. I am working through my GCTLT through Otago Polytech and hope to advance my knowledge and skills base with this course. My blog address is petes blog Pete Douglas
hello pete I am so glad you found your way to the wiki page Pete. It is excellent to have your perspective as representing a public organisation such as the fire service. If you click the watch tab you will get an email alert when anyone posts to this page - as long as you have added your email address to your profile. If you have set up a blog it would be good if you could post the link here. --bron 23:04, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Hello my name is Hannah Joynt, this is a rather late start for me but am now on board, my Blog is http://hajflexilearning.blogspot.com/.
Hiya all flexible learning participants - after a slow start and many adventures away doing fashion things I have finally been able to set up my blog Sustain Fashion- hope to catch up with readings and comments over the next week - off to another conference - Costume Textiles - here this weekend in Dunedin which should be good fun and of course educational.Have already been in and viewed a few of your blogs so getting used to this foriegn environment. Although I use the web extensively for info. and research i have not utilised it as a communication tool (except for email of course)so looking forward to a new experience. Tracy Kennedy (Fashion).
Kia ora koutou, Yep I too am late in arriving on the wiki...... My name is Kristi Carpenter and I am a lecturer in the School of Occupational Therapy and in my third year of teaching. This is my second to last paper before I complete the GCTLT qualification. Clearly there is a need for those of us in education to be more flexible in our delivery, particularly in relation to the use of technology. SO I look forward to the opportuntity to build my skills in this course and getting to know you all in the process. The link for my blog that I have set up for this paper is http://kristi-carpenter.blogspot.com/
Hi there, My name is Chris Smith, I am a catering lecturer in the lovely Cromwell Campus & I currently look after the level 3 program.This is my second year at Otago polytechnic & love it.Im hoping I can catch up with you all as the course progresses & that I will have some new tools to help deliver our courses more effectively. My blog can be found at www.crompolychef.blogspot.com, and although under construction it will be updated regularly(I hope).
Hi everyone this is my new blog http://learningdrawinghannahj.blogspot.com/ . My previous attempt got shut down by Blogspot as they thought I was spam. Hannah
Kia ora everyone Mereana here. I'm a late starter with this course so am trying to catchup at the speed of light with Browyns assistance. Looking foward to gaining skills to allow me to increase my capacity to facilitate learning for students that i work with in the School of Nursing. My primary focus is working with 2nd year students in the Bachelor of Nursing programme in the Clinical setting and also theory courses relating to Maori health. Link to my blog
