Storyboard Revised

Title of Program: Bringing Quality Education to the Island of São and Principe


1. VIDEO
Five photo slideshow and video segment of the Island.
View words such as: (remote; little access to good education; poorly prepared teachers; poverty; poor resources) rolling up the screen.
AUDIO
Music of São Tomé

2. VIDEO
Video of children in a classroom without a teacher.
AUDIO
Narrator: Sometimes in remote areas students miss lessons because the teachers leave and there are not substitute teachers at hand.

3. VIDEO
Still photo of a student in front of the computer on a distance education learning environment.
AUDIO
Narrator: A distance education learning environment to cater for the students that do not have teachers and could also complement face to face education, making learning a more motivating experience for students by providing learning opportunities which otherwise would be impossible for them to experience.

4. VIDEO
Screencast of a Prezi show with the principals of online learning. Words that appear on the screen:(equivalent curriculum; inclusion; learner engagement; innovative approaches; effective learning; formative assessment; summative assessment; coherence, consistency and transparency; ease of use; cost-effectiveness).
AUDIO
Narrator: Introduces the principals of distance education while they appear on the screen.
1. Equivalent curriculum: The curriculum should be equivalent to the curriculum in a face to face environment with clear objectives, with relevant content coverage, with appropriate student activities and assessment.
2. Inclusion: Present content in various forms to support students with different learning styles, social backgrounds, gender and with different types of impairments.
3. Learner engagement: The pedagogy should motivate and engage the learners and have a worthwhile educational aim.
4. Innovative approaches: Learning approaches must be fit for the purpose of the course.
5. Effective learning: Providing materials for the learner to choose the one that suits them best, exhibit multiple perspectives on a topic, giving the learner a global view.
6. Formative assessment: Aimed at improving learning by providing rapid feedback, by providing opportunities for peer assessment in collaborative environments, and by providing opportunities for self-assessment.
7. Summative assessment: Should be valid and reliable.
8. Coherence, consistency and transparency: Objectives, content, student activity and assessment should match each other.
9. Ease of use: As well as being transparent in its intention, distance education should be transparent in its ease of use by being open and accessible and intuitive.
10. Cost-effectiveness: It should be cost effective.

5. VIDEO
Screenshots of wikis, blogs, discussion boards, forums class chats, Skype chats and videoconferencing.
Phrase appears on the screen: Conrad and Donaldson (2004): “collaborative acquisition of knowledge is one key to the success of creating an online environment. Activities that require student interaction and encourage a sharing of ideas promote a deeper level of thought.”
AUDIO
Narrator: Reads Conrad and Donaldson’s phrase: “collaborative acquisition of knowledge is one key to the success of creating an online environment. Activities that require student interaction and encourage a sharing of ideas promote a deeper level of thought.” Retrieved from their book Engaging the online learner: Activities and resources for creative instruction. (p5)

6. VIDEO
Screenshots of online social communication environments such as facebook, twitter, myspace, skype and wiggio.
AUDIO
In the world there is a growing acceptance of distance education because of the increase of online communication among people. Students are using new tools; they are becoming comfortable with online discourse and are getting the opportunity to communicate with diverse groups.

7. VIDEO
Video of a student speaking over skype with another student while working on a distance education team project.
AUDIO
Synchronous and asynchronous learning; the asynchronous environment allows the student to log onto the class at any time, access discussions and think about what is being discussed before posting their discussions. It invites the student to reflect on what is being studied. The synchronous aspect of the distance learning environment benefits the community building aspect of the course as well as the delivery of an online class in real time, which facilitates the interventions by the students. The instructor should guarantee students stay on course and within the topic of study.

8. VIDEO
An organogram of an online system learning framework.
AUDIO
Narrator: Presents the learning system framework.
1. Learning outcomes;
2. Courseware development team;
3. Curriculum delivery via the learning management system;
4. Library and other learning object repositories;
5. Services;
6. Student information system;
7. Secure server;
8. User’s portal;
9. Quality Assessment process.

9. VIDEO
Screencast of the distance education site that I created for the project, integrating three different portals for distance education. Screencast shows the learner entering the distance education environment and accessing a lesson, a discussion board activity and viewing the collaborative tools.
http://teleformacao.edu20.org/ appears on the screen.
AUDIO
Narrator: Explain the site which has three different distance education management systems. One portal was prepared for the university students at the local university; another was prepared for teachers continued training, and the last portal was created for secondary school students who do not have teachers or by classes in collaborative work or using the virtual laboratories.

10. VIDEO
Still photo of Dr. Leslie Moller.
AUDIO
Narrator: Says that we have the opportunity and honor to have an expert speak about distance education, Dr. Leslie Moller. Presents biographical information on the main speaker Dr. Leslie Moller, explaining his long journey through distance education.
Music of São Tomé

Assessing Collaborative Efforts

1. How should participation in a collaborative learning community be assessed?

According to Siemens (2008), collaborative learning communities can be assessed
• through peer assessment;
• through online communities;
• by educators based on student contributions ;
• by educators based on metrics supplied by the management systems.

2. How do the varying levels of skill and knowledge students bring to a course affect the instructor's "fair and equitable assessment" of learning?

Assessment is based on stated outcomes, yet the concept of assessment has broadened and students are also assessed on the degree of the student’s development throughout the course.

3. If a student does not want to network or collaborate in a learning community for an online course, what should the other members of the learning community do?

Students in the learning community can start looking out for them. In the case of the educator, he/she can see when the student is in the course and call him in to communicate or the colleagues can communicate to get them to participate or simply look out to see if they are having any problem with their coursework.

4. What role should the instructor play?

The instructor is the person that is responsible for the degree of social presence that is managed in the online community, and they way that this is managed is by setting the rules in the beginning, yet giving the student a sense of comfort and belonging. The instructor is also responsible for letting the students feel that he/she is there to assist when a hurdle appears in the way of progression preventing the student from feeling overwhelmed.

5. What impact would this have on his or her assessment plan?

According to Siemens, assessment is a teaching based activity which is based on authentic activities and that when the instructor assesses they are also assessing their participation as educators.

References:
Laureate Education, Inc. (Siemens, G.).(2008). Assessment of collaborative learning. Principles of Distance Education. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Bringing Quality Education to the Island of São and Principe. Storyboard.

1. Five photo slideshow of the Island.
View words such as: (Remote; little access to good education, poorly prepared local teachers, poverty, very poor resources) rolling up the screen.

São Tomé Music.


2. Photograph of children in Principe High school, without a teacher.

Narrator: Introduces the shortage of teachers on the island of Principe and speaks of the implementation of a distance education program for these remote areas and how the educational levels could increase greatly in this way.


3. Still photo of Dr. Leslie Moller.

Narrator: Introduces key speaker, Dr. Leslie Moller.

4. Dr. Leslie Moller using webex video conferencing tool.

Narrator: Greets Dr. Leslie Moller


5. Short excerpts from videoconferencing presentation on the advantages of distance education for people in remote areas, giving them the opportunity to have well developed programs and giving the students opportunity for collaborative work as well.

Dr. Leslie Moller speaks to school directors and people involved in the educational development in São Tomé.


6. Link to full video on top of still image of children using the distance education resources.

Music of São Tomé.

Flowers of São Tomé

Here are some flowers that exist in the Island of São Tomé.  Nature is wonderful and technology helps us share it. To see it better you can find it at: http://www2.skyalbum.com/album2/2011/201104/20110403/doloresjardim/4d996bf5082/Flores_de_S%E3o_Tom%E9.swf

Enjoy!

Collaborative Interaction

According to Dr. George Siemens, acceptance of distance education is growing due to the increase of online communication between people, whether they are family members, colleagues or strangers with whom they need to collaborate. Communication and collaboration with diverse and global groups has become much easier and more efficient in these last years. Dr. George Siemens believes that distance education will be impacted by new communication technologies, and that the higher education institutions will all gradually adopt distance education technologies although he also believe that face-to-face education will not be abandoned. Dr. Siemens did nevertheless not believe that k12 education would adopt national requirements for distance education. I also believe that online communication has become very important, and that people whether they are young or old are starting to use this technology to communicate among themselves.

According to Palloff and Pratt (2005) collaborative activity is important both in the face to face education and in distance education as it promotes the development of critical thinking skills; reflective thinking; creation of knowledge and meaning with collaborative group and transformation thinking.

Collaborative online communication is a very important aspect of distance education. The collaborative tools are more by the day; there are the wikis where participants are able to collaborate in the creation of documents, blogs where participantes are able to share their work, interact and collaborate, some social networking sites such as wiggio where students are able to collaborate and even use the tools in the classroom. There are google docs, google groups; voicthreads, there are also tools for videoconferencing among which we find skype. There is also Elluminate, Webex and Dimdim5 for webconferencing.

Maria

Distance Learning

Distance Learning

"Distance education can be defined as Formal education in which the learning group (teachers, students, resources) are separated by geography and sometimes by time." (Simonson, 2010)
Distance education is not identical to face to face education, it is equivalent. The courses have the same learning outcomes but in distance education learning experiences need to be provided in order to accomplish the outcomes.

Distance education is becoming very popular in post-secondary education. According to Moller,Foshay, and Huett, (2008, July/August) distance education will become dominant with concerns such as course development, workload, intellectual property rights, collaboration and salary. In the future competition will be in favor of institutions which provide the best and most effective distance education.

K12 education does not have as much demand as does college education. In the k12 site based distance education is becoming very popular. In rural areas site based distance education allows highly qualified teachers to instruct students, that otherwise would not have any teachers.
Some online high schools allow students to take courses from home while others require computer labs supervised by teachers. In the case of K12 instruction, there are few opportunities for personal interaction and the student may feel isolated. The amount of independence, the synchronous versus asynchronous environments and technology required needs more research. I personally think that distance education is a breakthrough and that through distance education students all over will have e access to education.

References:

Huett, J., Moller, L., Foshay, W. & Coleman, C. (2008, September/October). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the Web (Part 3: K12). TechTrends, 52(5), 63–67.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010). Distance Education: The Next Generation [Webcast]. Principles of Distance Education. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Moller, L., Foshay, W., & Huett, J. (2008, July/August). The evolution of distance education: Implications for instructional design on the potential of the Web (Part 2: Higher Education). TechTrends, 52(4), 66–70.

Reflection

As this course comes to an end, I can´t help but feel a little sad. The time I spent in the whole program was wonderful and I learned so much from the teachers and my peers alike. I wish all of you lots of success as teacher leaders in the integration of technology in your school districts.


I am so excited to start using emerging technology in my classes as well as inspiring my administrators and colleagues to start using them as well. As was stressed by Johnson, L., Levine, A., Smith, R., Smythe, T. (2009) in the Horizon Report, there are new technologies which will be adopted within the year, others in the near future and others still, in four to five years time. All the tools I had opportunity to try out seemed so wonderful and will be able to be used in the classroom by me or by other teachers. I had the opportunity to see some tools that are fantastic for student motivation and commitment. I have seen other tools that would work so well in some of my colleague’s classrooms because of the specificity of the work they need to do with their students. After this course I realize that what I knew about technology was not really much compared to what I have come to learn, especially in this course. I also realize that I still have a long way to go and that I need to be prepared to adapt new technologies in my classroom and that I need to guide my fellow colleagues so that they too may do the same.

Our students are the twenty first century digital natives who use technologies on a daily basis and we as educators need to implement these technologies as educational tools to support, transform, expand, and deepen students learning. Brann, A., Gray, T., Piety, P. J., & Pacuilla H.S. (2010) believe that there are five key dimensions of science education for struggling students which are:

1. Physically doing science or “getting a mechanic grip” on the natural world

2. Visualization, representation, and modeling

3. Science literacy, vocabulary, and discourse

4. Questions, argumentation, and use of evidence

5. Student engagement and identity with science

Multi-user virtual environments for professional development and for student participation in learning networks such as teen second life, skoolaborate and flatclassrooms fulfil these dimensions. I have already started using some cloud based and collaborative tools such as voicethread, blogs, wikis, prezi, glogs, webquests, surveys, virtual field trips and simulations. I have already motiveted some of my colleagues to start using some of these tools as well.

www.flatclassroomproject.org

Flatclassrooms are ideal for activities that are performed on a worldwide scale where students are able to exchange ideas and experiences that will definitely be extremely beneficial for all involved. One of the flatclassrooms projects this year is “the way the World Wide Web changed the world” which is ideal for my “Science, Technology and Society” students which have a module on Technology. This is a wonderful opportunity for these students to learn more about technology and share their ideas and thoughts with students in the same program from schools anywhere in the world.

http://www.skoolaborate.com/

Skoolaborate is a Multi-user virtual environment prepared for educational purposes so it is the ideal setting for educators to use with their students. My “Quality, Environment and Security” and my “Science, Technology and Society” students have a learning module on sustainable development which gives me the ideal opportunity to have them do a project on sustainable constructions and have them construct a sustainable home in this virtual environment.

I enjoyed the videogames and know that there are many wonderful games out there. I just wish there were more good games for secondary school science. Hopefully they will start appearing soon. I saw good math games and good games for younger students.

I am going to commit to the purpose of changing my colleague's views on the integration of technology in the classroom and I am going to keep myself updated with the emerging and the disruptive technologies that may be of use in education. I have also joined the Kappa Delta Phi Honor Society, which is a good way to keep myself updated on what is new in education and educational technologies. I am also thinking of continuing my studies at Walden.

Maria

Brann, A., Gray, T., Piety, P. J., & Pacuilla H.S. (2010). Using Technology to Support Struggling Students in Science. Center for Implementation of Technology in Education.1-23.

Johnson, L., Levine, A., Smith, R., Smythe, T. (2009). The 2009 Horizon Report: K-12 Edition, Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium.