- What were your experiences and feelings during the session? If you have impaired vision or hearing, how did this affect your participation?
While in the session I was feeling a little bit of stress because I was worried whether the sound would have been fine due to a lack of the sound during the previous session and at the same time I was feeling happy that I have heard other colleagues too and that we had a fruitful discussion all of us. We were actually 4 persons in the session and instead of break up in groups of 2, after a trial, the tutor decided to put us again all together so that we could discuss all of us in one. No problem with that at all. What is something that I am not so fond of is that when we are over 3 people then when there is a discussion it is logical that I need time to think in order to reply and when the people are quiet I feel that I have to say something without having to do so actually.
- What did you learn about the Sfard paper itself? Were some parts of the session more useful than others in this respect?
I have learnt about the two metaphors and my colleagues experiences with these metaphors and also tutor's thoughts on the two metaphors. I believe that the most important part of the session was the one that we were discussing on the 3 questions raised.
- Can you come to any (perhaps tentative) views about the pros and cons of Elluminate for the task you were set, in the context of a Masters module of this kind? Do you feel, for example, that this synchronous event carries more status when compared with online forums? (You'll remember from Week 3a that Goodyear (2006) argues that this is the case.)
The pros of using Eluminate is that you can discuss and meet online using audio conferencing with your colleagues and at least hear their voices instead of writing only in the discussion forums with a photo or even without a photo at all. Another advantage is that the use of a whiteboard is very helpful when you carry a group activity as everyone can see the notes on the board and even write on it, change something, draw another thing and participate in an activity placed on the whiteboard. It is good that it is a synchronous event and there is the feeling of a classroom, i.e. raising hands, ticks, crosses, clap hands, disagreement icon etc. There can be group activities too when you break up a larger group of students. The cons of this event is that someone might not feel confident to talk synchronously and prefer texting in order to participate and that will take more time to answer a question and maybe the group will move further till the answer will arrive in the chat box. Another drawback is the sound quality and some time lags that the sound goes away and comes back.
- How far, if at all, would Elluminate or a similar tool be useful in your own context?
In my own context Elluminate will not be used or any other similar program as what is now happening in primary schools is not happening with technology of such strength. The only technology that is happening is computer lessons for the basic skills and these are held face to face.
- How would you design the activities?
I think that I could make my activities targeting to a group of students and most probably in a way that I could break them up in smaller groups and put something on the whiteboard, various activities for them and most probably I would end up the session with a general whiteboard activity on the matter that I will be examining and share different opinions all together as one group.
- If you are already using a tool of this kind, how do the activities you run compare with the session you have just completed?
I have used before this tool for another activity in another course but it was not like this one. We were more members in the group and we were all talking and it was more difficult for more people to communicate effectively in one hour and come to a final result, whereas now, we were more close to each other and to our conversation although there were times that the sound was poor and I had some difficulties but after the first 5 to 10 minutes it was perfect!