Week 2

I am not finished with the readings, I'm finding it difficult to get through all the reading assignments between the two classes...I've tried working a schedule out, but I'm not finishing them in time.
So from my initial readings regarding the Distance Education by Bernard, I never realized how long distance education has been around. I did get a little lost in the reading, but did agree with the point "attention to quality course design should take precedence over attention to the characteristics of media. This presumably includes what the instructor does as well as what the student does," as well as "active learning" both those stuck out for me in the reading. I think
because it helps keep the students attention.
Although, I am not finished with the entire second reading assignment, I am enjoying it much more and finding it more useful than the Bernard reading. One of the biggest things I had heard at my previous job from our online users was they enjoyed those courses that offered the "real word" situations, which was a characteristics of authentic activity in Chapter 2 of the "Teaching and Learning online" assignment. One of the things we tried to make sure we did was to always use real, life-like situations for our courses. I haven't finished this reading, but will update my thoughts when I'm done.
I also joined the Watercooler 2.0 group that consists of Phil H, Greg J, and Jessica D - we will be focusing on social learning applications, such as Web 2.0 in the workplace setting for our trend analysis project. I'm excited as I think we have a really great group of people.

Week 1, Day 1 - Tired Already

Tired already, really?! How can it be, alas it appears I have fallen under the sniffles and sneezes among head congestion, so my energy level is not up to par. I am excited for this semester to begin and learning the trends and current issues in eLearning. When I was working full-time, I felt somewhat current, but now that I've been mostly a stay-at-home mom while pursing my MA, I sometimes feel out of the loop.

So, I hope to soak up as much as I can...