Ramble #13
My video this week discusses the possible benefits of distance learning for students. It is fitting given the topic of my blog this week!
On Tuesday this week we had a wonderful presentation from Shannon Magee and Chris Fredrickson from Manitoba Education. They told us all about online learning and distance education within the province of Manitoba. They also provided us with a Google Doc that was chock-full of resources relating to online learning and distance education.
The most notable to me was Blackboard Learn. I slightly remember learning about this last year. This year it seemed a lot more relevant to me because as a first year teacher (next year) I will take all the course/subject resources I can get. It is amazing that so many high school courses have entire course plans, activities, and assignments all laid out for us. I will definitely be using this service to gather resources for courses I am teaching in my final student teaching placement!
I was really impressed by the many tools available to us teachers within Blackboard Learn itself. The collaborate tool is very helpful, allowing us to "skype" chat with our students in a collaborative fashion. I was also intrigued by the plagiarism catcher tool built in to the platform. This is an incredible tool for us teachers to ensure that our students are not stealing content online. Being that it is an online course, students may be more tempted to steal content online as compared to a traditional course in a classroom.
The presentation got me thinking about the future of education. As these online LMS get more and more advanced and user friendly, could physical schools become a thing of the past? It sounds crazy, but the future might just be CRAZY. In the education program here at B.U we have talked extensively about incorporating emerging technology into our classes. We haven't talked all that much about the idea of emerging technology taking kids out of our classes. Could students learning from home become more and more prevalent as online education becomes more and more advanced and effective? This will undoubtedly impact us as teachers moving forward in our careers. Who knows, in 15 years we could all be online educators!
Until next week!
I also really enjoyed Blackboard Learn, as you mentioned it will be a good resource to use our first year of teaching. It's interesting to think where education could go with the advance of technology, although I do wonder about what the future holds in regards to education.
ReplyDeleteI also really liked the idea of Blackboard Learn and all of its tools. The plagiarism checker is definitely of interest for me and I am excited to try it out and see how well it works. I've never considered how LMSs might impact out future teaching careers...interesting thoughts! Thanks for sharing :)
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