Blended learning -what other educators are saying.

[helend]

This is worth looking at for several reasons :

• see what other educators are saying about blended learning,
  
• see how twitter is used by educators to learn and share,
  
• see how the comments are collected thanks to hashtags #edchat
  

tinyurl.com/2wwfc7f
or
rliberni.wordpress.com/2010/11/09/blending-of-face-to-face-learning-with-online-learning/

Any thoughts on this ?

[patriciaceola]

Sometimes, as teachers, we feel overwhelmed by all that amount of inforation and technology resources, as it is something hard to keep up with. However, it is fascinating.

I believe the good news is that we don't need to catch up with ALL this technology. I'd say we're long for that little bit of technology that excites us (because our learners will learn with it) and that is probably going to excite our learners too (not necessarily for the same reasons !).

Let´s concentrate on that, and forget the rest -- there's just too much of it to keep up! Some of it won't be around, anyway, in about six months to a year.

[mariabossa]

I agree that technology resources are fascinating and it's impossible to catch up with all of them; there are new sites, blogs, wikis... everyday so when I get used to one, it becomes old or doesn't exist anymore.

[anisoara]

I totally agree with you Patricia that we also may sometimes feel overwhelmed by technology and the tremendous amount of information we can reach through it.
I sometimes start looking for something inspirational for my classes and then plunge deeper and deeper into other topics that have actually little connection with the initial search, only to realize I had lost long hours of sleep or maybe doing other chores!

It would be practically impossible to be updated on each and every aspect, and as you say, we just need to take bits from here and there and apply them in our contexts, see if they work and are successful. And then re-initiate the search....

[submauricio]

Hi all!

Like I said in another post, you have to find what works for you. Whether it is a website a blog or a wiki, you have to find a format or type of online content you feel comfortable with and browse similar ones. Let's say I need to teach a specific part of grammar but I want to do it using a wiki but I have no idea what a wiki is, then I'm going to spend hours researching about wikis and at the end I'm not gonna search the specific part of grammar I wanted to teach in the first place.

I'm not saying you shouldn't be open to new things but that you don't have to take them all in at once.


"Make do with what you know".

[anisoara]

Hi again Submauricio,
hope you've already learnt how to use wikis
Great quotation again, loved it
Anisoara

[obenausova]

I am involved in blended learning, I have been working in that field for at least 8 years and have done a lot of research in that sphere. In this article all educators are very positive about it. In our department, I am one of the team of four people who do anything in that field, and I am the only one who is quite enthusiastic about it all, developing new online material all the time. Other colleagues think it is too much work, not worth the effort. Many people in our school (from other departments) mistake e-learning with digitalizing their textbooks and uploading them online. In the English dept. we do much more - interactive exercises, quizzes, streamed presentations, embedded videos etc. OK, not to keep this too long, I will speak about students'perspective elsewhere.

[helend]

I agree (again !!) I have the same problem with colleagues imagining that we're just having fun and not teaching/learning !!
I think that it can be easy to feel overwhelmed by all the possibilites on the web - we just have to pick things that appeal and develop things little by little.

[mariabossa]

Hi! We must go with the flow if not.... the flow will take us!!! Students are bored in our classes if we don't go with the flow which is... social networking, blogs, wikis...
Smiles, Maria

[sophiac1]

I believe that blended learning is getting a must, and we have to follow the new trend, which seems luring. For sure, it is more interesting to learners eyes, and it will help them get more involved. Involvement will activate participation and participation will enhance practice which actually leads to fluency.