final post

Final post:

I learned that a blackboard course can be more than just sixteen DB posts and a research paper, and be informative at the same time. I learned more, at least about myself, than I ever have in any other online course. I have reinforced many opinions I'd developed in my educational career regarding pedagogy and methodology for my classroom, with actual research this time around. I've learned that the addition of a yahoo messenger ID for the random "off the clock" questions is a lifesaver, and have incorporated it into my courses I teach at EKU. I learned that not every educator wants to perpetuate the system we're in, and realized, much like I have, even in my short time (2005-present) that things can be fixed with the proper fusion of technology and and applicable problem solving skills. Tech won't get you everything, but it will get you further than you already were, if used properly. If we use these toys the right way, there's no reason our educational system has to stay the way it is.


The only thing I would change is a little less emphasis on blog posts of our own, or at least the frequency requirement (not that I ever really stuck to even close to the requirements). Once a week, tops, including comments. One comment, one post, not daily.

last outpost as a reading intervention

I posted a review of last outpost, but apparently I left off a key component. Here's hoping I get this shoe-horned in and get the full credit.

I wouldn't use this to offset someone's lack of reading skills, or attempt to improve them. The frustration level with the game, from a personal perspective, would be even much more evident with a student behind academically. The fairly frequent grammatical errors in the displayed text of the game and the lack of a consistent syntax checking system-or the willingness of the mods to correct them, brings me another bone of contention. Giving a poor reader a poorly constructed text to read will not help them. If someone who knew what they were doing and were reading on-level I would consider this as an extra credit assignment, wherein they would generate a reaction paper much like mine, but I wouldn't go anywhere near this program with a student behind the curve.

last outpost vs. astaria

subtitle: if I want an online x fantasy, I'd rather be playing WOW.

I have had two opportunities/experiences with MUDS, in all their grammatically poor, low-color glory. Astaria was my first experience, and it was a miserable one. Maybe I was expecting different, but I guess MUDS just arent my think. Last Outpost is a much more well constructed online experience, and the help system, both in-game and web-based, was much more efficient, effective, etc. I suppose I have a vivid imagination, because the descriptions lept off the page, and I could often picture myself going through an old middle-ages village. Astaria's lack of help, and limited resources frustrated me at every turn. I was only told to play the game, not to reach a certain level before going on to the assignment aspect of the game. Had that been the case with Astaria, I would have failed it. Last outpost was constructed enough that once I got used to the shorthand and the command system, I figure I probably could have gotten along well myself. Dr. Lowell was a tremendous help, and I wouldn't have made it to the forest to get leveled up before the deadline without his assistance. I would have wandered around, eventually getting to level five but not nearly in time enough to get the assignment done. The text based s/v command system was a bit clunky, and a complete list of every term on a web-page outside of the game that I could have toggled between would have been a boon to my existence. Get/put/drop , and get.all were some terms that at first were highly foreign syntactically, although the flow of the game moved quicker once I learned the shorthand commands for the shorthand commands NWSE instead of the full directions, for instance. I logged off the game immediately after hitting level 5, but, unlike the miserable wart on the back of the MUD universe that is Astaria, I might just head back into Last Outpost and play around, once Christmas break comes, of course. I've got too much other to do to devote to significant forays into that MUD area at the present time. The ony regret I have, is my username. As I loaded up the login screen early on, I mis-typed my usual password as the username, so instead of something awe-inspiring, like the darkknight of destruction or something like that, My username is also my dog's name. Not nearly as draw dropping as one would hope. The quests were a little bit lacking, but I suppose you have to build to something. As a warrior, if I was immediately able to drop orcs and other things, there wouldn't be much fun to the game. But finding a piece of bread for a janitor was a bit lame as a first quest, I felt. I suppose it was just a practice for the getting used to the command structure, but I would have rather done something a little more challenging (although that first quest did take me quite some time, longer than I had expected, so maybe I'm not as good as I thought.)

I am not at all a mideval fantasy kind of guy, and if it comes down to it, I would rather go for something with a gui that I can see the image unfold in front of me. Give me Sim City, Call of Duty, and my Wii Fit board first, but if I've got no other options, I might just go hang out in last outpost.

Final project

I decided on a final project, trying to tie in a computer program I have had success with in a collaborative classroom method, to a distance learning model. I have used Sim City, in conjunction with social studies classes, as a way for students to get a small opportunity for creative expression, while learning simple economic principles like the effects of taxation and demand on a society. Sim City 4 is the best one-on-one model for a classroom-wide project where the kids build a city, and try to reach a particular set of goals- X number of people, Y number of jobs, at Z tax rate, etc. The only limitation is that you can't take the city online. The new Sim City, Societies, allows you to post your progress to a page on the EA (game publisher)'s website. This way, you can keep track of all the previous goals, although it is not a live look, like spore or other online games by EA. It is still passable enough to allow a teacher to check progress, and in conjunction with a blog page where the students post a reaction, it allows for a lot of interaction between teacher and student.

On a professional level, I feel like there could be more I could be doing, and so I actually asked my lead teacher why we do what we do, in the way we do it, last week. She called me into a meeting with the principal. I sent a series a questions as to our instructional methodology via email and we went down the list. I had a positive experience. I kept insisting that I didnt want to be a bad guy and didnt want to cause trouble, I just wanted to know why we do what we do, and why we can't do some things differently. The meeting was productive. I had essentially no prior experience with IEPs and the like prior to this year- I had one student with an IEP, and it was to allow him to do his math on a calculator. I taught freshmen english, so his accomodation didn't apply.

is Distance ED part of the solution?

I teach part-time at Eastern Kentucky University, in their English/Theatre department. I teach English 101 and English 102. Two sections of 101, one of 102-I've only got an MA, so I don't get to do more. I would love to, but thems the rules. Anyway, I digress. My english 101 class reads from a book called "World of Ideas" by Lee A. Jacobus. In it, there are selections from all the great minds-Machiavelli, Plato's allegory of the cage, etc. We just went through a couple of discussions in a row from the unit of the book on "education." The unit includes essays from Maria Montessori, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Dewey, Paulo Friere, and Frederick Douglass, all of whom share their thoughts and experiences with education in the United States. ALMOST ALL OF the essays call for reform, and for a move from a "deposit" form of education, a passive experience for the learner, to a learner centered model (emerson's essay is about 160 years old and he advocates that, and reform, moving away from the prussian model), where problem solving and real world skills are paramount. I look at the educational system I am a part of, and realize just how little we have done to accomplish ANY of that. It frustrates me beyond all measure. Every day I feel like I should abandon my path and strike off on my own, design my own model school in my way, but I do not know if I would survive if I did it, so I keep perpetuating the same inadequate system. I think that distance ed, and techology, used properly, has some benefits for a move toward that kind of system, but it doesn't hold all the answers either. We're not even close.

attending a conference

This week I "attended" a conference for K-12 educators. Entirely Online. It was a new experience, and in a lot of ways, more informative and better in the long run for me. I got to pick and choose the content that was relevant. I liked that concept. The conference officially closes this week, but the content stays up for a while. I learned about it from the RSS feed of Generation Yes! blog.

k12onlineconference.org is the site. check it out.