Atologist [at-ol-uh-jist] n

Question: 1. A Learning Contract is a written agreement between the student and tutor that sets out what will be learned, how that learning will take place, and how it will be evaluated. Learning contracts allow the student to be more responsible for their own learning and self-direct it a bit more. Research has found that adults in particular learn material more deeply when they learn it though projects of their own choosing rather than being taught that same material in the more traditional sense. Learning contracts also set a framework which facilitates more individualized instruction. ("The Benefits of Learning Contracts & How to Design One" http://tinyurl.com/ogjg3ux)

Here, we are asking you to set your own Personal Learning Objectives (PLOs) at the outset of the module. This approach enables you to reflect on the weekly topics from your own professional perspectives and it also gives you the opportunity to develop your personal learning networks as you discuss meaningfully, with like-minded peers, how technologies could be utilised to enhance learning, teaching and assessment experiences. 

What is your Personal Learning Objective (PLO) for this module? Try and word your PLO as a single sentence statement. Then, write a short paragraph of no more than 300 words explaining: a. why you are focusing on this area of TEL b. what you currently know about this area c.what you want to find out about this area This will give us some insight into you and the perspectives from which you are undertaking this module, allowing us to support you better and direct you towards resources of potential interest.

Answer: My main objecties involve: Expanding my knowledge and experience of online technologies to enhance my AT practice to support students. To expand my knowledge of UDL regarding app and web design. To create online material that engages students. To expand and connect my technology work to link with the DIT technology based graduate attributes. I have recently acquired some app development skills and have launched an AT app called 'ATNorth' for 3 platforms. I want to expand this tool and I am hoping this module will give me some ideas. I have also been expanding my video and infographic skills and am hoping to use them in a new way.

Question: 3. (3) What are you going to do in order to achieve/accomplish the aforementioned PLO?

Answer: To accomplish these I would like to : find people in the group to collaborate with, to create a useable aretefact for my practice to develop my digital skills and UDL in an applied way

Question: 4. (4) How are you going to prove that you have achieved your PLO? Who will benefit from the product of your learning and how will they evaluate it?

Answer: I will prove this by way of items/ artefacts that I create. My students and I will benefit from this. This will be evaluated by my peers and students.

A list of featured Skillshare classes. Categories include popular now, new releases, most liked projects, and best of.

Q. Pick one of the trends or topics discussed in this week's readings/resources and reflect on the effect (good and/or bad) it could have on education in your discipline/domain. Post your ideas (300-500 words, or a 2-3 minute recording) to the discussion forum by midnight on Sunday 25th January. These postings will form the basis of the webinar on Tuesday 27th January.

Beginning point:

Sourced: Top 10 IT Issues, 2015: Inflection Point

http://educause.edu/ero/article/top-10-it-issues-2015-inflection-point

By Susan Grajek

Change continues to characterize the EDUCAUSE Top 10 IT Issues in 2015. The pace of change seems not to be slowing but, rather, is increasing and is happening on many fronts. There is reason to believe that higher education information technology has reached an inflection point—the point at which the trends that have dominated thought leadership and have motivated early adopters are now cascading into the mainstream...

...In Crossing the Chasm, Geoffrey Moore describes a pause or chasm between early adopters and the mainstream.An inflection point in adoption is reached when mainstream adopters cross that chasm and begin to enter a marketplace. As Moore describes it, they are motivated not by the desire to innovate (which motivates early adopters) but by the need to solve a problem that their current solutions cannot address, a need that activates an otherwise cautious group. When solutions become available that address their particular problems, members of that group will adopt new technologies....

This main streaming of early adopters of technology is a concept that interests me as a n Assistive Technology Officer. Within the two and a half years that I have been in this role I have seen a large increse in technology ownership. As well as this a growing number of students are becoming very tech savvy in regards apps, website applications, software in general and browser plugins. Some of this awarenss happens in schools, ECDL training and PLC courses. Even though there are still a large cohort of students who are still technology novices even with laptops and smartphones they are in general open to using their devices. This openness to use technology is motivated by the demands of their course, their desire to succeed, support of staff and social networks.

"Instead of reacting to new technologies, top institutions seek out new technologies as a strategic imperative, leveraging these innovations to improve learning inside and outside the classroom with data decision making, enhanced pedagogy, and better student outcomes." —Lisa M. Davis, Vice President for Information Services and Chief Information Officer, Georgetown University

The range of technologies and devices can be daunting to staff and students so the need for institutions and the staff within to test, filter and pitch these to students can further promote the early adopter mentality and attitude to technology. This is essential for a number reasons:

-technology skills are intrinsic to college

-technology supports students with disabilities

-it allows contact between staff and students

-it facilitates collaboration and socialisation and academic development

-it develops transferrble skills that graduates can bring to the workplace

By Susan Grajek and the 2014–2015 EDUCAUSE IT Issues Panel

Change continues to characterize the EDUCAUSE Top 10 IT Issues in 2015. The pace of change seems not to be slowing but, rather, is increasing and is happening on many fronts. There is reason to believe that higher education information technology has reached an inflection point—the point at which the trends that have dominated thought leadership and have motivated early adopters are now cascading into the mainstream. This inflection point is the biggest of three themes of change characterizing the 2015 EDUCAUSE Top 10 IT Issues (see Figure 1). A second dimension of change is the shifting focus of IT leaders and professionals from technical problems to business problems, along with the ensuing interdependence between the IT organization and business units. Underlying all this strategic change, the day-to-day work of the IT organization goes on. But change dominates even the day-to-day, where challenges are in some ways more complex than ever. This "new normal" is the third theme of change.

Inflection Point

Change. It's a song that's been playing everywhere the last several years. You've been humming the tune, perhaps dancing to its rhythm. You may not know all the words, but everyone knows the refrain: "Mobile-Cloud-Big Data-Business Value-Agile-Transformation-Social-Analytics-Online Learning." Some people know just a verse or two, some know several, and some are even helping to write new verses. If change has become a standard, what is new about 2015? Well, nothing has changed. And everything has changed. Information technology has reached an inflection point.

Mathematically, an inflection point is a point of change on a curve in which the concavity reverses sign. Colloquially, the term is used to describe a turning point that results in extraordinary change. Andy Grove, Intel's former CEO, described a strategic inflection point as "that which causes you to make a fundamental change in business strategy."1

As Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee assert in The Second Machine Age, this all comes back to Moore's Law, which posits a cyclical doubling of computing power.2 This doubling represents a rate of growth that is exponential. Perhaps the most vivid illustration of the power of exponential growth is Ray Kurzweil's concept of the second half of the chessboard.3 This concept is based on a legend about the invention of chess. When the emperor asked the creator of chess to name his reward for having invented the game, the inventor requested that for the first square of the board, he would receive one grain of wheat, two for the second square, four for the third square, and so forth, doubling the amount for each square. Kurzweil noted that although such an exponential growth pattern accrues only modest quantities at the beginning, when the second half of the chessboard is reached, the ensuing increases produce almost unimaginably large amounts. Viewing the impact of Moore's Law from this perspective, we can see that technology will at some point reach the second half of the chessboard. Brynjolfsson and McAfee posit that this has already happened, and they call it the second machine age: "Computers and other digital advances are doing for mental power—the ability to use our brains to understand and shape our environments—what the steam engine and its descendants did for muscle power."4 Analytics, cloud, mobile devices, social media, and online education might all be viewed as the fruits of the second machine age. IT architecture, process optimization, service management, and risk management are efforts to manage this overwhelming bounty.

What does the future hold?

Webinar Groupwork - 20/01/2015

Screen shot of group work with Orla.- Written piece added to Discussion board.

Overall we spoke about a type of art project and the parts that would be in the assessment e.g. 2 parts, one visual and one written. For the visual part this could includes the need for photography as a form of documentation, so use of Flicker and Thinglink could be used and then comments/ feeback could be given here.

A wiki could be used for the written part and this would track the contributors. Or the use of Gmail Document maker to facilitate group assignment making too.

To also facilitate group work, the use of an app/ website called Trello could be used by the Lecturer to track the roles and responsibilities of students in a group. This colours codes/ identifies the individual students so all roles and work is visible and can be checked to see if work is completed. The projects in the end can be exported as Excel sheets and then assessed.

To facilitate the digital assessment part all groups could be advised to use a core group of technologies e.g. Trello, Wiki and Flickr- and all can be accessed by the lecturer. Then they can augment their project with more technologies around these 3. This gives all groups a commonn technology basis and allows them to be creative and add more technologies.

Q 1. What is Kevin O’Rourke’s twitter handle?

@kcor1964

Q 2. What was the hashtag used for The 12 Apps of Christmas initiative?

#12appsDIT

Q 3. What two curated topics does Frances Boylan have on Scoop.it?

http://www.scoop.it/t/technology-enhanced-learning-teaching-assessment

http://www.scoop.it/t/free-tools-for-l-t

  Q 4. What was the name of the MOOC that DIT ran twice, on the Coursesites platform, in 2013?

Pharmamooc

Q 5. Name the event that the Learning, Teaching & Technology Centre (LTTC) at DIT (www.dit.ie/lttc) run every June for 1 intensive week?

Elearning Summer school

Q 6. The JISC report Effective Assessment in a Digital Age refers to 4 broad perspectives on learning and notes the different assumptions made about the nature of learning and approaches taken to assessment and feedback within each perspective. What are these 4 perspectives to which the report refers?

The associative perspective

The constructivist perspective

The social constructivist perspective

The situative perspective

Q 7. Noted also in the JISC report Effective Assessment in a Digital Age is a brief summary (6 bullet points) of good assessment for learning. (This summary emerged following a JISC-funded ESCAPE project at the University of Hertfordshire)

Engages students with the assessment criteria

Supports personalised learning

Ensures feedback leads to improvement

Focuses on student development

Stimulates dialogue

Considers student and staff effort

Q 8. In the video E-assessment. Where next?, what’s the name of the technique that the interviewees are experimenting with in relation to the marking of eportfolios specifically? (hint – 3 words)

On demand assessment

Q 9. The Teacher’s Handbook on e-Assessment defines e-assessment. What is the definition given?

E-assessment involves the use of digital devices to assist in the construction, delivery, storage or reporting of student assessment tasks, responses, grades or feedback.

Q 10. What are the two reasons noted in Teacher’s Handbook on e-Assessment for why serious games have not been widely adopted in higher education?

This week, we offer some general examples for ways to improve education using game design techniques. Also, here's that link I promised: http://www.deathball...

Chosen Games- Flood Sim

(1) Does the game support assessment and if so, how?

Firstly I did Gaming can have a place in Assessment but it does depend on the game. 

A game that links to Twitter/Google +  and posts results that can be shared is a good idea. Also its proof/ indicates that they played the game e,g, www.typingclub.com/

However, Floodsim did not have this feature so why am I using it as an example?

Well, from the selection of games I tried I though it was the most playable, i.e. suitable to 1st years (not childlike) and the issues and skills around the flooding issues would provoke discussion/ develop social and group interaction as well as provide instant feedback from the strategies that would be attempted in the game - students like fast feedback. 

For a lecturer, it could facilitate groupwork- as students devise strategies with the limited resources and compete with other groups to have the highest positive outcome. Assessment in the class could be speedy and incorporate participation. Also, as an introduction to the tiopin of flooding and policy it would impart key terms and concepts that could be expanded on by the Lecturer to develop a lecture. 

The disadvantage with the game, involves its inability to save and output the scores/ team members and strategies involved. So for other forms of assessment it may not be appropriate.

(2) What disadvantages or barriers can you see to using games or game elements for assessment with your students?

Some barriers could involves students not taking the game seriously as they may associate games in an informal way. This could lead to them just randomly hitting icons to just complete the task. 

The students would have to be aware that there were points to the game that would transfer and inform a lecture and assessment. This could encourage appropriate interaction with the game. 

The competitive aspect of games does not always suit all people. Some students are just shy, challenging or just not a fan of games (and the concept of losing). So there may be the need for a brief conversation with students about sportsmanship. 

Lastly, internet connection in DIT can be challenging at time so you never know when this can be a problem.

Finally, identify at least one way in which you might use games or gamification techniques to support assessment in your own professional context. If you don't think games/gamification will work for you, then say so and explain why. Tweet your answer using the hashtag #DITTELTA.