Course Journal - abiramitceit.files.wordpress.com · started using Moodle for Course design. In this FDP Design activity, I learnt both MoodleCloud and gnomio.com Moodle. 5 June 2018,

A.M.Abirami Assistant Professor, Thiagarajar College of Engineering (RC ID: 1173) Madurai [email protected]

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IIT BombayX: FDP301x Mentoring Educators in Educational Technology

Course Journal

I. Learning from FDP301x

II. Reflections on FDP301x

III. Mentorship

FDP301x Mentoring Educators in Education Technology, IIT Bombay

Started May 17, 2018

Every summer/winter vacation, I attend any of IIT Bombay’s FDP courses since 2016. I

heard about these courses through my other colleagues. All these courses are excellent,

fabulous, and keep me motivated to learn more in Educational Technology and

Pedagogical practices for Higher Education and the immediate application of them in

my classrooms.

This year also it was started with FDP301x’s office hours on May 17, 2018 by JK !!! I was

really impressed by the plan of eoutreach team for this FDP, importantly, when they

announced the module FDP Design Activity. So far, only IIT BombayX team used

Moodle. Now, we were given opportunity to use Moodle, create course in Moodle site,

and so on.

The only thing that I really worried was “Mentor Mentee Interaction”. I had not got

any good experiences last year. But I had some confidence that IIT Bombay team would

take necessary steps to overcome them.

This “Office hours” were really great!!. Though I missed two of such sessions, I learnt

that doubts clarification session could be well organized using Technology (google

forms for questionnaire collection under different categories). It made us to prepare for

the office hours ready with the questions. We were forced to ask questions, and made to

explore the problems assigned. I found that this is based on “Backward Design

Instructional Design Model” in this FDP301x. This type of doubts clarifying sessions

helped everyone to be “doubts free” on the particular topic.


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The team had planned to overcome the technical difficulty by using YouTube Live

telecast. But this facility made us to enjoy Office hours during our vacation. We accessed

this anywhere, anytime !!

Finally, the real part of FDP301x started!! The team was announced on June 1, 2018 and

the Activity Checklist was given on June 4. Our team was energetic and enthusiastic one.

We immediately formed a WhatsApp group after sharing our PhoneNumbers through

mails. We started working as a team towards the objectives of FDP301x.

I. Learning from FDP301x

(A) TPACK Model [May 23, 2018]

This FDP301x started with the introduction of TPACK model. Without knowing this

model, I started practicing this in my classrooms. I use Powerpoint presentations

with animations for delivering DataStructures concepts

(datastructurestceit.wordpress.com – List ADT, Stack ADT). Most of the famous DS

problems are selected from the websites like geeksforgeeks and given to Students to

improve their problem solving skills. The Active Learning Strategies like TPS and

Peer Instruction are followed to strengthen this activity.

However, I felt that I missed Reflection Spot in my classes. I learnt this important

pedagocical concept in this FDP301x. I used to throw Questions to the Students and

I never bothered whether all students were involved in solving the problems. It was a

mistake from my end and I never realized it. This FDP301x made me to realize this

critically. I learnt that the Questions should induce the critical thinking ability of

students; sufficient time should be given to extract their thoughts; multiple

perspectives on the topic should be discussed either through Peer Instruction mode

or through Discussion Forum. The participation of Students in Discussion Forum is

further evaluated by Reflection Quiz.

(B) Kirkpatrick's Training Evaluation Model [May 30, 2018]

Learnt four different levels of Kirkpatrick’s model Reaction, Learning, Behavior and

Results by which the effectiveness of training can be evaluated. It can be applied to

measure the effectiveness of Teaching/Learning in Colleges among Students as

follows:

Reaction – students responses to course feedback


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Learning – students performance in tests, assignments, exams, etc

Behaviour – students performance in Corporate after their placement

Results - Academic Results, Employment Offers

(C) FDP Design Activity [5th June – 2nd July 2018]

I have created courses in Wikispaces and Canvas. But this is the first time that I

started using Moodle for Course design. In this FDP Design activity, I learnt both

MoodleCloud and gnomio.com Moodle.

5 June 2018, 6.30 – 7.30 pm

We had a Conference call over telephone. We started our meeting with Agenda and

ended up with the set of tasks for each team member. Meeting Minutes is embedded

in this document [Annexure 1]

9-Jun-18, 11.00 – 1.30 pm

Started my Course Design activity in Moodle by answering Focused Questions in

Discussion Forum, started new discussion threads, and posting replies to existing

threads

11-Jun-18, 10.30 – 2.00 pm

Reviewed already framed LbDs for the course, thereby learnt the Quiz

Administration in Moodle like editing questions, the different types of Questions,

and the CBT ranking module.

12-Jun-18, 11.00 – 2.00 pm

Edited Reflection Quiz in Moodle

12 June 2018, 6.30 – 7.30 pm

We had a quick meeting over telephone. We had reviewed our design and planned

for improvements. Meeting Minutes is embedded in this document.

13-Jun-18, 10.00 – 12.30 pm

- Learnt User Account module and enabled Guest Login, Self-Enrolment using

Plugins for MoodleCloud. (Ref: https://docs.moodle.org/22/en/Guest_access)

- Learnt the excellent feature of Moodle, the “Moodle Wiki”, from the LxT resourcs

and framed Assimilation Quiz questions

https://docs.moodle.org/22/en/Guest_access


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13 June 2018, 6.30 – 7.30 pm

We had a quick meeting over telephone. We had reviewed our design and planned

for improvements. Meeting Minutes is embedded in this document. [Annexure 1]

14-Jun-18, 10.00 – 1.00 pm

Edited Knowledge Quiz and used different question types like Matching

Questions, Missing Words, Placing image in Question, Theme changes in Moodle, etc.

15-Jun-18, 6.00 – 7.00 pm

Participated in the Discussion of Gradebook set up, Progress bar set up, Activity

completion charts, Course Feedback along with other Team members.

16-Jun-18, 10.00 – 1.00 pm

Designed Rubrics for RCA, and Feedback forms. The use of Dependency question for

next question is excellent feature in Moodle Survey.

18-Jun-18, 10.00 – 11.30 am

The Course design was almost ready. Did a complete review on the course and gave

feedback to TL.

21 to 27, Jun-18

Participated in the Discussion Forum to answer the queries posted by the Peers

during the assessment

29 June to 2 July, 2018

Participated in preparing Self Evaluation Report

II. Reflection on FDP301x

I have set the Reflection Questions “What am I going to learn from the Peer

Assessment of FDP301x?”, “What could be the key take aways after this assessment?

“Am I going to adopt any new features that I have come across?”

Having set the questions, started Peer Assessment on 21-Jun-18. The following

observations created positive impact:

- excellent presentation

- video quality of LeDs

- use of Glossary


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- good set of Course Entry survey and Feedback questions

- use of “Chat Module” for online discussion apart from Discussion Forum

The following were the lessons learnt from other courses and these items need to be

considered for next course design

- navigation and sequence of course topics

- coverage of advanced learning materials

- readability of Quiz questions

- time limit for each topic or entire course

- licensing information when sharing publicly available resources

Having done one Hour course design using gnomio.com Moodle and participated in the

Peer Assessment of FDP301x, I have set up my objective as using Moodle for my

Classes in this academic year. I have decided to use Moodle because it helps the

Teachers to closely monitor Students’ participation and performance in the course,

compared to Canvas/Wikispaces.

III. Mentorship

(A) Reflection on Discussion Forums

I have gone through Discussion Forums of FDP101x (Part I and II), and FDP201x.

(i) I found no deviations from the topic in the discussion threads. Participants replied to

posts either to the context of the topic or saying “good”, “great”, “nice idea”, and just

escaped from the elaborated discussion.

(ii) In one of the Discussion Threads “Focus Question & My Opinion <arpitachandra>”

Q1. Among the various technologies that you have been exposed to which will be an easy

technology to integrate into your classroom immediately?

Q2. What challenges do you expect while integrating this technology into your classroom?

Many of the participants replied “great”, “good”, etc. Writing replies like this in

Discussion Forum is not advisable. One has to understand the question and elaborate on

the topic such that it enables other participants to get different perspective on the topic.

In another Discussion Thread “screen O cast - CPM & PERT - construction Project

Management – Establish <tramesh1227>’, many participants commented that it was a

https://courses.iitbombayx.in/courses/course-v1:IITBombayX+FDP201x+2018_T1/discussion/forum/users/233544


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“good video”; only one or two participants commented on the video quality, or the

content. Writing simple replies like “good”, “nice”, etc would not help anyone for their

improvement. It would be better to elaborate on the topic, by giving additional

resources, references and so on.

(iii) Some participants had given new ideas/views while most of them wrote “good”,

“nice”, “great work”, etc. The reasons could be

- not spending enough time to explore on the topic

- not suitable to their interest

- mandate participation in Discussion Forum

These could be the major reasons for not getting new views/ideas on the topic.

(B) Mentor Mentee Interaction

Date Description 31-May-18 IIT Bombay’s mail on Mentor-Mentee Assignment 04-Jun-18 Mail 1 sent mail to all mentees asking for Mode of Interaction 06-Jun-18 Mail 2 reminder mail sent to Mentees, asking for updates 07-Jun-18 - Mail 3 reminder mail sent to all Mentees, asking for updates

- Eoutreach also sent mails to all mentees 09-Jun-18 - Mail 4 sent mail to all mentees and reminded about OER submission

date - Mentee 1 responded that they were not aware of this activity and deadline

10-Jun-18 Mail 5 sent mail to all mentees and informed the date extension for OER submission

14-Jun-18 - Mentor 2 responded to mail, but no updates on OER was given - Mail 6 sent to all mentees and insisted on doing the Peer Assessment, though if submission was missed

24-Jun-18 Mail 7 sent to all mentees and asked whether grievances are shared in survey forms

Poor responses from Mentees and I was not sure whether they had completed OER

submission task. The mail communication is embedded here as part of evidence.

[Annexure 1]

I have got a great satisfaction from this FDP301x ! I have learnt how to use Moodle. I

have been acquainted with new Technical Friends from this community. I have come

across different set of Teachers with their perspectives on ICT use in Engineering

Education. I feel proud to be part of the Greatest Digital Movement towards Online

Education Platform !!!


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Annexure I

Team 111 Meeting Minutes – 1

Team 111 Meeting Minutes – 2


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Mentor Mentee Interaction


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Documents

Course Journal - abiramitceit.files.wordpress.com · started using Moodle for Course design. In this FDP Design activity, I learnt both MoodleCloud and gnomio.com Moodle. 5 June 2018,