General+Discussion

=General Discussion= July 8 Hello Gang!!! Thanks Peggy for putting it all together!!!! I will read over and see if something else needs to be added or modified. Thanks everybody for the excellent job!!!!

July 8 Peggy, I will read through and over the weekend I should have comments, I have skimmed through, Great work ! only seen a few typos. thanks for putting it all together. I am logged in now as my self, I tried the file upload and everything looks like it should except, the upload was halted due to some IO error. Well now I know why i didn't get the window to select my file initially, thanks Peggy. July 8
 * OK - just heading out for the evening but wanted to post the revisions. Thanks Mary & Ifeoma for the helpful comments. Mary, I've tried to incorportate your ideas in various sections of the paper instead of in the Evaluation & Monitoring section because we weren't planning to go into such good detail for other aspects of the evaluation/monitoring. Ifeoma, I've put much of your work into the conclusions. Brian, I haven't done anything to your Benchmark section (maybe changed 1 sentence). Thanks to all for proofreading and making corrections. I still want to read the entire thing over again myself after a day or so - I tend to read in sections as I work on it, rather than the complete document, so it's not uncommon to find duplications, etc. Or parts that I just included quickly but forgot to go back and expand upon. I think we're very close now, but certainly if you find anything you want modified we've still got the benefit of some time. You've all been great to work with! ~ Peggy
 * [[file:Assignment 2 Draft 3.doc]]

July 8 I have done a short paragraph for the Evaluation and Monitoring section and added some thoughts for the Technologic infrastructure. Hope it helps. I have sent you an email and i will try to upload the file here as well. July 7 I have done a short paragraph for the conclusion. It should be in your mail boxes but i thought I'd put it here as well. Please let me know if you have suggestions. Ok, I can't seem to be able to upload the file here, Peggy? Help!!

July 6

 * I've uploaded another draft. I've found it easier to work in Word than on Google Docs, but can copy it over later into Google. Still lots of writing room to stay within our 3500 word limit (but sometimes less is more). Needs a conclusion still, and could be lacking in other areas as well. If you have a chance to have a look at it before our meeting this evening that might give us a focus for our discussions.
 * [[file:Assignment 2 Draft 2.doc]]

July 5

 * I'm doing some more work on the draft version - in Word (because it's easier for me to work there) but will move things into the Google doc later.

July 4
A good article from our reading list – Chapter 13 in the Plan to Learn resource, by Mykota & Bonneycastle. “An instructional design model for program management: a case study of the implementation of an online post-degree certificate in special education”. []
 * Happy 4th of July Brian! (A formerly celebrated holiday of mine - I'm originally from Iowa, and have dual citizenship). Anyway, sent you all an email with this note:

**June 29**
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 * A post from Ritwa on the current class discussion board that I love. I've highlighted the key part that I'd love to include in our paper. Thoughts?:
 * I believe it is about time that institutions re structure their programs to **//bring education to the students, rather than making it mandatory for them to come to get the education//**. Students of today have many challenges, thus we need to adjust to help them to cope. We need to be cognizant that we are actually have clients (our students), hence we need to make the product of a high quality for them.

June 30 mary

· Institutional Level · The program or course level · The disaggregated elements
 * First of all, I would like to thank Peggy for writing down the first draft; the way you developed and connected all the ideas was excellent. I kind of like the way you organized it by using the point form, it seems clear but we can always think about presenting it in a different format. I think the name of the school does not really matter and the one you choose seems to suit the whole idea of “a school without boundaries”. I would like to say that we are pretty close to the final result; we need to define the “Evaluation & Monitoring” section as you mentioned before. I remember Brian suggesting we follow (Sangra, Guardia, and Gonzalez-Sanmamed, 2007 - pg 284-299 in Bullen & James) quality evaluation for e-learning which I believe will fit into what we are looking for. I believe Sangra et al.2007 p.294 refers an experience where quality indicators were used by following a benchmarking process, so I am not sure if Brian was following these thoughts.

**June 28**

 * You should all get an email notifiation and link to the draft version now posted in Google docs. Keep in mind just an early draft and certainly not finished. Benchmarks, for example, not included - I've added a new heading; perhaps they can go there. More needed on Evaluation & Monitoring - I just put something there for now. I really didn't do much about corporate sponsorship other than mention it as a possibility, in part because I got to thinking about where in the planning process of the conversion we are at - if our school is still in the early planning stages, details such as that would not be set, and I kind of like having our assignment reflect an earlier stage of planning (does that make sense?). If so, then I think our benchmarks will need to be a little less specific as well. This point (of stage in the process) didn't really strike me until I started writing but I think the assignment is more valuable to us if we view it from a "helicopter" view as opposed to lots of granular detail.
 * Benchmarks -
 * I started writing in point form to keep myself organized, but then kind of liked it. We can lose the point form approach if you like.
 * I changed the name & location of our school, but feel free to change it back. Do you all understand the significance of "Second Life" and Linden? I figured that Tatiana & Mark will get it.
 * Ifeoma - thanks for the information on the EQAO. I'm not familiar enough with it to see how this should fit into our recommendations - any ideas?

June 27 June 26
 * I was working on an early draft. Didn't finish, but have a look and see if it's going in the right direction. I have to go out for awhile, but thought I'd post what I've got so far in case you want to have a look. Didn't have time to get it up in Google Docs and formatted decently, so I'll just try this for now.(This is new for me to try - uploading & linking to a document, so tell me if it works for you)
 * [[file:Rough Draft 1.docx]]
 * Question - for public schools in SK a Board of Education is the main decision-making body for a school division. Does anyone know what the proper term would be for the group that would oversee a private school? Board of Directors? Trustees?

June 24. June 24 Mary Hello gang! well i definitely agree with you Peggy. I think there are really great ideas and excellent thoughts to complete the assignment. I personally do not mind if you guys have to make modifications; i think it is great that we can do that so the final result will be better. That is the whole point!! peggy the nice weather is calling me...lol.. so i will be quite happy if we can get the assignment done and have some extra time to enjoy the weather!!lol Thank you all for the great work!!!
 * Great work guys! Things are really fleshing out. I'll spend time reading over things tonight (tomorrow I won't be much help again), but I think we're definitely on track to finish early - it would be nice to have that final weekend just to re-read & tweak after letting a draft version sit for a few days. I would be happy to take on a major role in writing - there's lots of great starters & more in here already. I will do some thinking about the corporate relationship and may make some changes (I've just had a quick glance), and still hope to look at some other strategic planning documents. We seem to have a high (or is it low?) instructors - a pupil - teacher ratio of 10:1 which even for a private school may be a bit unrealistic, so there may be some tweaks there - but I suspect we are all comfortable with others making changes & modifications. I'm really very pleased at how well we are all working together on this!

June 22. Peggy

June 22 mary No problem; I am a visual learner so i need to write and see it on paper before i can start writing something....sometimes i end up changing the ideas many times though lol!! I think we have the information we need, we just have to put it together....i know that is the hard part! lol
 * Mary, I appreciate the outline. I think I needed to see it organized like this. -Brian

> > Mary June 21 > > "We also thought we could arrange the paper in a similar way to Assignment 1 – Context, Environmental Scan, Vision, & Implications, although we should also perhaps build it more as a strategic planning document perhaps. Lots of examples on the web. " > I was just reading all the great information that we have so far in the wiki; however, I am still trying to organize all these ideas and see how we are presenting the paper lol. The way you suggested we arrange the paper is appropriate; however, when i was reading the assignment outline this is what i understood we have to do ( please correct me if i am wrong).
 * You're right Mary - the organization will differ from Assign 1, and your outline is looking good. I can see adding information on evaluation/monitoring to recommendations, and funding & costs will fit in somewhere. I'll start reading over some of the case studies which should help figure out if we have any gaps to filll, and additional ideas on the structure of the paper. ( Oh, & thanks on the chemistry comments. Actually receive another thank you note about it yesterday from a BC teacher).

1. Describe context ( what we have now/what the school is now)

2.The vision ( what the " school without boundaries " will be)
 * Target population
 * Faculty and students computer literacy
 * Technology Infrastructure ( Physical, human suport, funding) Bates (2000.p.76)
 * Describe the planning and managing approach...if there is one
 * Describe the technology plan...if there is one and pedagogy.


 * Use of e-learning for both on campus and off-campus teaching
 * Educational Design
 * what is the rationale for using e-learning?
 * How the use of technology will affect faculty and students?

3.Recomendations


 * Rationale that supports the recomendations
 * How to implement this vision through the use of e-learning?
 * what changes are needed?
 * What strategies are needed for implementing these changes?
 * 1) Strategies for inclusion and Buy-In ( Bates.p 48 chapter 2)
 * 2) Strategies for student access to technology ( Bates.p.85 chapter 4)
 * 3) Strategies for faculty support ( Bates.p105 chapter 5)
 * 4) Strategies for funding ( Bates.p 153 chapter 7)
 * 5) Strategies for educational technologies ( Bates. p 181 chapter 8)


 * Reasons for the changes we are given and the choice of strategies ( focus on at least five or six strategies and describe them)
 * Evaluation and monitoring the e-learning in the " school without boundaries"

June 19

Btw Peggy I was checking the site you created for the quemistry class and you did and excellent job!!!! i will denifitely look at that for future reference!! thanks for sharing!! Good points here Mary i wonder if we should not be adding Student computer literacy under context description yes that can be included as well Ifeoma
 * Brian & I did manage to meet on Saturday morning and discussed a few items. In his job he will be creating some online courses; I mentioned I've done so in the past. Here is the link to my online Grade12 chemistry class, created for Province of Saskatchewan. I've had some good comments about it from people from around the world who have gotten some good use out of it, so it's nice to know the hard work has paid off, but you could do so much more now with the new tools available!
 * []