WEEK 12 – POTCERT MID-TERM REFLECTION

Well, here we are at the mid-term.  We have been introduced to so much valuable information to make our students’ learning experience a more rich and rewarding experience.  With the onslaught of info it is now my responsibility to put the technology to use in a productive and exciting fashion.  Thankfully, I have a bit of a winter break to update my current Blackboard site with some of the great information.   I teach medical billing and coding, and I have found some great Youtube videos produced by an other instructor on how to use the ICD-9 coding book.  I will be adding these to my Blackboard site after I have added captioning.  I also will be adding some of the Blackboard and library information videos to my site.  With the use of Diigo I can add a list of great websites for students to explore (with instructions) for a better insight into the medical billing and coding field.  The textbooks that I use through Cengage Brain has a great website for better student understanding of materials.

I will need to improve my communication through my blogs and will be practicing throughout the  winter break.  Since signing up with Facebook I have been enlightened about the communication going on with my friends, family and students.  Amazing sharing of info.  I have been able to communicate with my kids daily when commenting on their posts.  Tons of fun.

After taking the self-assessment check, and receiving a 4, it is apparent I need to spend more time on this technology and need to interact more often.  My blogs were usually not that useful to other users and were more my own assessments of information.  Again, I will be working on this in the next semester.

This POT course has been well constructed and leads one to more and more and more information.  I will work on the pieces of the pie to create a course that is lively, interactive and involved.

Sometimes my BRAIN HURTS with all the information.

WEEKLY REVIEWS:

WEEK 1 <a week 1-potcert</a>  INTRODUCTION WEEK    Getting familiar with the technology.  Spent time reading ahead in the Ko and Rossen text.  Setting up a new blog site, reading the POT blogs, and learning how to use new sites.  Spent time in previous week in Collaboration hosted by Todd and Lisa.  WOW!  What a ton of information.  (Interesting how personal this experience has become.  We only connect through this blog and yet I feel personally attached.  Didn’t expect this kind of emotional learning experience conducted via the “magic cloud.” Wonder why?)

WEEK 2  <a week 2-potcert</a>   Spend time to get familiar to with the technology.  You can go down the rabbit hole if you spend too much time delving.  Oh, what time is it?  I need to go to bed so I can get up early for work.  Made use of the Getting Started Chart and read Ko and Rosen.

WEEK 3  <a week 3- potcert</a>  Started getting more involved in adding information to my blog and Blackboard sites.  I added this as a tool for my web site.        <ahttps://sites.google.com/site/rushtonsresources/homePowerful and Free Tools for Teachers and Students</a>

WEEK 4 <a week-4-potcert-catching-up</a>  Still reading the Ko and Rosen text.  Getting caught up after family death and funeral.  Interesting all the interaction on Facebook and other websites about the death and funeral.  An easy way to communicate with loved ones about the funeral and family gathering.  Glad I had the knowledge about different social media so that I could post appropriate information for family around the country.  Signed up for Faculty Focus, Khan Academy and Coursera.  Great information sites.  Enjoyed the great online class tours.  Especially interested in my mentor, Sandra Dyke’s,  online class as we both teach business classes.

WEEK 5  <a week-5-potcert</a>  Still reading and watching the great videos.

WEEK 6  <a week 6-potcert </a> Reading and watching videos.  Learned to embed videos onto my blog site.  Also downloaded some videos onto my Blackboard site.  Spent a lot of time exploring Youtube.  Took the Internet Skills quiz, and was surprised that I knew so much.  Learned about RSS feeds.  Signed up for Google Reader.

WEEK 7 <a week 7-potcert</a> Reading and watching Pilar’s and Jacqueline’s video.  Signed up for Twitter.  Commented on blogs of other POT CERT paraticipants.

WEEK 8  <a week 8-potcert</a>  Reading Chapter 6 of Ko and Rosen.  Created a Thread from Pilar’s Voicethread.  Viewed Collaborate.  Watched the Potcert video.

WEEK 9 <a week 9-potcert</a> Reading Chapter 7 of Ko and Rosen.  Checked out MERLOT and created an account.  Created a Diigo account.  Spent quite a bit of time on Second Life, but not willing to use this in a class setting.  Bookmarked the Three Generations of Distance Education Pedagogy using Diigo.

WEEK 10  <a week 10-potcert</a>  Reading Ko and Rosen.  Checked out Engrade, but will be using the Blackboard site for grades.  Spent a lot of time checking out all the videos and writing copious notes about the great information shared.   Checked out the blogs from POT cert.

WEEK 11 <a week 11-potcert </a>   Read Ko and Rosen.  Watched the videos.  Learned about online accessibility issues.  Want to make sure that I do not violate any laws by not making everything accessible.  Want to make sure that I credit all material I use.

WEEK 12  Well, now to the present.  I have completed all the reading assignments and viewed all the videos.  Very interested in using the Teaching and Technology Innovation Center with Karen Korsted.  Interested in using Camtasia/Relay and myscreencast w/captioning.  Really spent a lot of time viewing the MiraCosta’s library resources.

What a great review to go through my posts.  I had a chance to also review all my written notes about this new information.  This also gave me a chance to clean up and edit my notes.  I then had a chance to use the technology when I relearned to post a link to my previous posts.  Yeah.  This has been a great learning experience.  There is such a large body of information and it is so nice to be directed through the technology maze.

Thanks for all the great information and looking forward to implementing more of them into my present Blackboard site.