Helpful Tools in the Classroom

In this course, I had the opportunity to practice with various technology tools to support collaboration and facilitate my learning.  Whereas I have had some experience with most of the tools, this class actually allowed me to explore them more in-depth. The tools that I found to be the most helpful and that I can see using in my own future courses are Moodle and Google Docs.

I found Moodle to be extremely practical, clean, and efficient. Course resources and information were easy to access. The weekly outline was well organized and helped me keep things straight. I liked how we uploaded our assignments and received feedback from the instructor (via written and audio) right in Moodle. The forum feature we used for the first week‘s discussion was easy to navigate.  Overall, this course management system has a well-designed interface, which is easy to use. I would definitely use Moodle for my own courses.

Google Docs was a great communication tool for us to share our ideas and engage in rich discussion. I loved all the editing and formatting features, which made it fun! It was easy to use and I intend to use it in the future. The one thing I did not like about Google Docs is that I could not access it offline.

Skype is a real-time communication tool, which allowed me to share ideas with the members of my group, which closely approximates a face-to-face experience. However, in all instances when using this tool for this class, either the video or audio feature did not work—but never at the same time. When the video feature did not work, we were all still able to engage in a meaningful discussion. When the audio does not work, it makes it more challenging. You can still use the chat feature, but that is not as efficient and you do not get that face-to-face feel.

Final Thoughts…There is overwhelming potential with existing technology tools (and ones that have not yet been created) that can facilitate student centered learning and collaboration. However, it is important to keep in mind that the tools you select to use and how you use them should be shaped by the objectives of the assignment.