Monday 21 January 2013

Time to Fess Up

Five Ball
Photo Credit: timailius via Compfight cc

It is that time of the year again and we are nearing the end of the first week of EVO sessions. Every year I sign up for too many and then I have to do a lot of juggling. You might be wondering how many I have signed up for.

OK, there's Neuroscience in Education , an exciting new course with Carla Arena and her team. It promises to be very interactive and fun and, on top of everything, we will learn a lot about the brain and learning. Then there's Developing Mentoring Skills. There's MachinEVO, a very challenging course on how to create educational videos in Second Life. My Second Life skills are a bit rusty (though they never were great), but the course looks very interesting. Oh, my poor neglected avatar!

Natalija Strikes Again

There are two courses which I have done before - Multiliteracies and BaW. When it comes to BaW, I have signed up to catch up with old friends and meet new people (after all, this is their 10th anniversary). I will probably not be able to do much more in this session. I am keen on Multiliteracies. In fact I need Multiliteracies in order to organise my learning.

I will try to explain. I am not sure my juggling metaphor from the beginning is correct. In connected learning, the five balls would not be seen as five separate online courses. Rather, forming connections among them would be what would keep all of them in the air. I am sure there will be a lot in common among the five sessions. I especially expect parallels between Multiliteracies and Neuroscience in Education. As Carla Arena explains in this post, it is important to make connections both within our brain and with other participants.

I will be using this blog as my eportfolio for these courses. Rather than look at each session separately, I will try to condense my 5-workshop experience within a single weekly post.

Ahem. I haven't told you everything. I am also doing OLDS MOOC, which is a MOOC on learning design. I'd signed up a long time ago and I didn't intend to participate when it started, but it looked so interesting. And it is. The workload is scary, but I don't have to do everything. Do I? I know next to nothing about learning design. Surely after the course is over I will know more than I do now? Also, I have an idea about a learning design project for English teachers and it is going to happen right here, in this blog. Stay tuned.

P.S. I am also doing a workshop on how to teach writing on SEETA.

8 comments:

Janet Bianchini said...

Dear Natasa

I admire your will and great enthusiasm for constantly learning new things. I wish you the best of luck in achieving as many of your aims as possible. It will be interesting to follow your thoughts on the sessions you are attending, which sound like a lot of fun.

Have a fabulous birthday on 22nd January :-))

Best wishes

Janet

Laine Marshall said...

I cannot imagine you are taking 5 EVO sessions. I cannot even think about more than one at a time. I will be following your blog to see how you integrate your learning from them. Great Idea!

Natasa said...

Dear Janet,
It is always good to see you. Have you joined any EVO sessions this year?
Thank you for the birthday wishes. Yours is tomorrow, I believe?

Natasa said...

Laine,
I know, it is crazy. Still, I love EVO sessions so much, I keep signing up even when I know it is time to stop.

Unknown said...

What a busy lady. As others have said it will be interesting to follow your progress. Good luck!

Janet Bianchini said...

Hi Natasa

Thank you! The same goes for me too! Yes, it is tomorrow and no, sadly this year I haven't joined any EVO sessions although I am keen to read posts and keep up with what is happening via blogs like yours :-)

Many happy returns of today!!

Best

Janet

Natasa said...

Janet,
I hope you had a lovely birthday. I am sorry you are not taking any sessions this year. I will miss our interaction. Never mind, there are always blogs.

Natasa said...

Bob, my plan sounds great, but I still need to see it through. I shouldn't have promised so much in this post, people have actually believed me.

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