Creating Surveys

I had decided to use the other survey Zoomerang because my colleague had already submitted a survey utilizing SurveyMonkey. However, Zoomerang & SurveyMonkey has merged. Either way I had never utilized either to create a survey. Currently, our institution utilizes Blackboard and this tool offers options for creating tests, quizzes and surveys. I was going to attempt creating a course evaluation utilizing the survey tool in Blackboard, so if all doesn’t go well I am still able to present my students with a course survey via Zoomerang & SurveyMonkey. I found this tool to be rather simple and useful. I like the sample questions are presented or you can make develop your own question that yields the appropriate feedback. Utilizing some of the preexisting question, I would say that this exercise took me about 15minutes. The problem I have with tools like these are if we want to utilize them we must come out of pocket. I notice that all of the tools presented allowed for basic plans, just enough to get you hooked. Before I make a decision to purchase I will go back to Blackboard and do some more research and create a survey through this tool to see if it yields the same results as the ones introduced in this module.

You can access my survey created through Zoomerang & SurveyMonkey at the following link:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/ZKJSM6C

Creating Your Own Content

For this specific assignment I choose to create a 7.35 podcast. The podcast is an introduction that outlines the course syllabus; CJ114: Administration of Juvenile Justice.

The podcast can be heard below:

Podcast Powered By Podbean

This audio would be posted in Blackboard and can be used in conjunction with the archived recorded synchronous/Elluminate Blackboard Live session. The audio is designed to reinforce and point out the most significant sections in the syllabus:

1.      instructor contact Information and office hours

2.      the learning objectives and outcomes

3.      the grading

4.      overall expectations of the workload

I’m thinking about using this next semester. I had an opportunity to experience this method prior to this assignment, elluminate Blackboard live session. I have to admit, I rather like this idea, the students can go back and listen to things they may have missed for some reason and the facilitator can spend more time engaged in other matters as it relates to the course. And as one of my colleagues has indicated I rather prefer to work in a manner where I am not on camera, that’s one of the excitements of being on line, no one really can see you and form opinions based on superficial perceptions. Also, I choose this method because I was most confortable; it took me only one try to record, there’s always room for improvement. The hard part was downloading and transferring but I finally got it.  I would like to thank you in advance for your kind words, meaning feedback!!!!

Diigo Toolbar - Annotate, Screenshot, Bookmark

In all honesty I never used any thing of this nature until being introduced to this tool via TT1221. This is a social bookmarking site used to tag and bookmark various web pages. This is a free tool that can be downloaded onto your tool bar, making the bookmarking process very easy.

Checkout some of my tags: http://www.diigo.com/user/angeep20carrie

SYNCHRONOUS COMMUNICATIONS

Because I currently engage in the use of Elluminate or texting, so I decided to venture and do the Skype option for this activity (which I hadn't used before). As usual my hectic schedule wouldn’t allow me to engage in this activity during a respectable time frame so I choose to Skype with my Brother-in-law who resides overseas, totally different time zone.

In any case, the chat started off very difficult, I was trying to Skype using my iphone. As indicated earlier time is an issue for me, I was at work attempting to conduct this exercise. I’m not sure if I mentioned this before but I am a law enforcement officer and I work from 6p – 3a, the times most of society is just getting home from work, trying to relax, getting their household situated or sleeping. I decided to use my iphone because driving around in a patrol car dose not lends itself to computer access. So any way the call kept dropping, it wasn’t until my brother-in-law realized that I might be in a bad area. He also indicated that this type of communication works best with internet or wifi connection. In addition, some phones though they have the capability they are still limitations, one would have to check with their service provider to ensure their plan supports this product. Once I realize these issues we attempted the call again and were able to connect much easier. This could certainly be a useful tool for simple quick chatting but probably wouldn’t go over very well in a large group setting or in a setting where it is important to attempt to guide users/chatters through an activity.

Technically speaking, there were so many issues, which if used in the education setting the facilitator need to provide very detailed instructions to the users. In addition, the facilitator needs to explain to the users that they should check with their service provider before using this method of communication. The upside is this produce can be used on a smartphone or computer. When utilizing this method I highly recommend a computer connection they are much smoother.

This was definitely a very exciting learning experience; it’s very similar to Facetime or Tango a feature offered by smartphones which allows the users to do very similar functions as Skyping.

ASYNCHRONOUS COMMUNICATION

Discussion Board, Blogs, Email are all forms of asynchronous communication.

Discussion boards are an excellent way to communicate, participate, journal and discuss with others in the course. This tool allows an opportunity for every member to post there thoughts, feelings and viewpoints while encouraging critical thinking skills; reflective in nature. They force students to read other perspectives and carefully consider a response In addition, online discussion boards offer these individuals a tool through which they can actively participate in the class without feeling the overwhelming anxiety they may feel with many sets of eyes on them.The use of discussion boards is an active method of learning, contrasted with the traditional lecture model that is much more passive. As many research studies have shown, active learning is more powerful than passive learning at getting students to learn, retain, and apply course content to novel and practical situations.

I believe that the main benefit of asynchronous (not real time) communication is that you can join and read forums at any time convenient to you, catching up with messages already posted. You can reply at once, or go away and think about your answer before coming back to reply; or indeed, as in a real discussion, you can simply listen without contributing at all. Discussion boards are generally archived, so you can print a particularly interesting or relevant discussion, equally you can return to it at a later point when further contributions may have been made.

Additional features, such as enabling ‘anonymous’ posting, ensure that what one may feel is a ‘stupid’ questions can be asked with impunity.

Diigo is something new to me and I would like to share this video explaining how-to bookmark:

 

You too should add this icon to your tool bar. Check our what's new with diigo: My Diigo account can be found at:


Check our what's new with diigo: http://blog.diigo.com/%22%3E%3C/a

My Diigo account can be found at: http://www.diigo.com/user/angeep20carrie%22%3E%3C/a

Tweet Tweet

I have never utilized twitter and I found it very difficult upon opening this account. First, I am a relatively private person so I choose not to utilize my actual name for this assignment; am uncertain if this has caused more confusion. I still need to spend more face time with this tool. I spent over an hour searching for a way to add someone else from this class and could not find it and I am still uncertain if I am utilizing this tool correctly. I have received no replies from any of my contacts. I had to seek from my younger sister and still don’t quit have the hang of this. This was definitely a new experience! Regarding the uses of twitter in education, I’ve seen several advantages. I could post announcements via twitter to my students, for a more immediate response since everyone has some form of PDA or Smartphone attached to their hip. Another idea could be simple searches for content specific material related to their area of concentration. In addition to research purposes. I’m quite sure I could find several other purpose once I learn how to use this tool more efficiently myself. So for this course I have opened up my very first account, you can follow me (@Angeep20Carrie) I enjoyed this excercise so much that I have now activated the app on both my iphone and ipad.