Communicate Reflection

Communicate Reflection

Answer in a complete paragraph response:

How has the Communicate module prepared you to meet each standard listed above? Yes

Please reference each standard by providing specific examples or links from your work in Communicate.

•  Standard C: The online teacher plans, designs, and incorporates strategies to encourage active learning, application, interaction, participation, and collaboration in the online environment.

Students will take part in a variety of exercises that lead him/her through the content. By communicating what the expectations are it helps the student know what the next steps should be. Getting started in a course is often one of the hardest times for a student. Finding their way around, knowing how to submit work and where it find help when needed are essential. It is important for the teacher to guide the student through this starting process to help them understand and gain confidence in the online environment.

Criteria C - Communicate 2 News: Describes how, as an online instructor, the participant plans to incorporate news items and announcements into the online classroom.

Using announcements in the LMS which go out to the students.

As an online instructor, how do you plan to incorporate news items and announcements?
Weekly Announcements
List of links to important videos
Monthly News letter

I would use these resources to inform the students about available iClasses, AP News and any new resources available to them.  Students would receive this information in an email  and could subscribe so they would get this email as soon a the information was posted.


What resources would you reference to format news items?
Announcements or Communications page in LMS
Weekly emails




Standard D: The online teacher promotes student success through clear expectations, prompt responses, and regular feedback.
Teacher must be very clear in what they want. Because they cannot see you, it takes away one method we have of communicating in the outside world. We must be cognoscente that a student is not going to be able to understand what we mean without directly telling them, One example is that often a student will not see all the different parts of the course. There is content, grades, Announcements and Discussion areas. Making a video of all these different areas is often a good way of showing students around.








Standard E: The online teacher models, guides, and encourages legal, ethical, and safe behavior related to technology use.
Videos are one of my favorite ways of showing the student how to do a task or what the expectations are. It is important in Computer Science (my area) to model how the code works and what errors can occur. This is best done with video.









Standard J: The online teacher interacts in a professional, effective manner with colleagues, parents, and other members of the community to support students’ success.
 Be sure to follow FERPA rules always! When communicating with students in the written form it is important to greet them by name, Discuss the concern and welcome questions. Never state an opinion or engage in any form of put-down, or sarcastic comment!







Standard K: The online teacher arranges media and content to help students and teachers transfer knowledge most effectively in the online environment.
Creating your space for students is important so that they can find all the required and helpful resources. The use of color is one way to do this. Creating a table (HTML) and coloring the cells is one way of delineating each area of importance.


Which strategies will you take away from the Communicate module and apply to your own teaching practices?
Rubrics with feedback are very effective.



Criteria C - Communicate 2 News: Describes how, as an online instructor, the participant plans to incorporate news items and announcements into the online classroom.
I use announcements for items that affect all my students in that subject area. Things like, how to sign up for the AP tests, lists of videos I'v made for a unit, example problem when there is a section or content that need scaffolding. 

Example: 


Hello, class!
Can't believe it, we are now into Week 3! A lot happened in week 2 which we will build on as the course progresses.

What happened last week?

You spent the week choosing your job and started to think about what makes a good job for you personally. There
were many factors to think about. Salary is always on top of the list but it may not be the most important thing about
the job.  Look at Section 12.5 “Normal Distribution.”


This week's work will be used twice! It's a two-fer!! Milestone #1 is the first part of your Final Project. You will write it this week and then all you have to do for the final is do the suggested edits and insert into Final Project! These are due on  Sunday 1/27/19 to be considered for full credit.

1. Finish any work not done in week 2 first! You can still get 90% on those assignments and you need them to move onto
   week 3!
2. The Milestone One project is due this week:  3-4-1 Final Project Milestone One: Job Offer Comparison.
3. Students must select a “track” in this theme (NOT a job!) for the sake of comparing three job offers.
   The three tracks are Humanities, Communications, and Design.
   Wait a minute! Didn't we already do this.. well, in week 2 you did pick a track and some of you picked a job,
   but you just needed to pick a track. Now we are going to look at more details of the jobs. 
4. This milestone scaffolds directly to the final project, as you will base your job selection on the comparisons made
   at this point.
5. You will need to use the statistics found on the Bureau of Labor website (BLS.gov) to complete this milestone,
   specifically on the following page: Occupational Employment Statistics

Other helpful links at this site: 

∙ Wage data by state

• Criteria F - Communicate Reflection: Reflects on teaching, and shares which lessons from Communicate will be most beneficial to you as an instructor in the online teaching environment.
• Which lessons were most beneficial for you?
  Rubrics - allow me to be consistent when grading free response or programs.

• 02.04 Primitive Data Types: doubles Grading Rubric
  Components	Points Possible	Points Earned
  Comments include student's name, the date, and a description of the program.	2	2
  Program compiles with no errors.	1	1
  Program runs with no errors.	1	1
  Output is correct and user-friendly.	2	2
  Integer variables are correctly declared using meaningful names.	2	2
  Double variables are correctly declared using meaningful names.	2	2
  Integer variables are correctly initialized.	2	2
  Double variables are correctly initialized.	2	2
  print() or println() methods correctly used.	2	2
  String literals and variables are correctly concatenated	2	2
  Thoughtful PMR included.	2	0
  Total	20	18

Communicate 3 - Evaluation Methods

Communicate 3 - Evaluation Methods

Answer in your blog:
How do communication practices in the online environment correlate to effective feedback? 
By breaking down the problem into parts and grading each part the student can see exactly where he/she needs to work on .

Why is authentic feedback important for online learners? By giving students arthentic feedback they can go over that area of content again, ask specific questions or know when a classroom practice is not being done correctly.

In what ways might an instructor enrich a student’s online experience through feedback?
Authentic  feedback is key to learning content and moving forward. Beacause a student cannot read your facial expressions or see how you gesture, it is important to understand what they did incorrectly.

Communicate 3 - Rubrics

Communicate 3 - Rubrics

Create: Utilizing one of the resources discussed in this lesson, create a rubric that integrates specific criteria for an assignment and also affords the instructor ample commentary on the student’s product. Make the rubric available in a post in your blog.

Components	Points Possible	Points Earned
Comments include name, date, and purpose of program.	1
Data read in from file.	2
Arrays used for all file data.	4
Enhanced/Traditional loops correctly used.	3
Decision statement(s) correctly used.	3
Integer constants used correctly	2
Arithmetic statements correctly written.	2
Output precisely formatted horizontally and vertically.	4
No compiler or runtime errors.	2
Output is correct and user-friendly.	2
Summary statistics written to a file.	3
Thoughtful PMR submitted.	2
Total	30

Communications 3 - Digital Feedback

Communications 3 - Digital Feedback

Answer in your blog: How do the resources you created would enhance the level of specific feedback offered to students?

A graphic would be more noticeable.
Students would work to achieve the  result of a graphic much as a star sticker on top of a HW Page
The graphics could become a well known much as a stop sign, stop light or any of many social icons we have.
Post in your blog: Place the three digital resources that were created in your blog.

 

Communicate 3 - Feedback

Communicate 3 - Feedback

Create: Choose a standards-based area of study and create an assignment.

Assignment:

• Take the previous lesson's program. Modify it in the following ways:
• Create a class out of the car desription
• Create a second file defining that class
• Create instances in the main method and print out the information from the instance variables of that class.

Then create a method for assessing student work utilizing one of the mediums discussed in this lesson. Ensure the tool demonstrates an instructor’s employment of effective feedback.

Components	Points Possible	Points Earned
Comments include name, date, and purpose of program.	1
Constructor correctly written.	2
Private instance variables declared.	2
Private instance variables initialized.	1
Statement to invoke constructor included.	1
Method headers correctly written including documentation.	2
Individual methods invoked on an object from main() method.	2
All calculations correct.	1
Output formatted with printf().	1
No compiler or runtime errors.	1
Thoughtful PMR included.	1
Total	15

Feedback:
xxx, You did a great job. All required components were present in your program! Mrs Noss

xxx, You did a good job. You were missing some parts to your constructor in your car class. Mrs Noss

xxx, Invoking a Constuctor takes place in the main method of your tester program . Please review my video at XXX and then resubmit your project. Mrs. Noss

XXX, This program would not compile and/or run. Please resubmit after correcting error. If you have questions please email me.  - Mrs. Noss

Communicate 2 - Synchronous Sessions

Communicate 2 - Synchronous Sessions

Answer in your blog: How does integrating synchronous learning sessions within the online environment assist in developing a learning community for students? Discuss this question at length in your blog.

Create and post in your blog:
An outline or lesson plan of a 30 minute synchronous session which you would facilitate.
Welcome message
Topic of the day on a pod - for loops
Uses of a loop
Mechanics of using a for loop
Screen share examples of different types of for loops
Return to iClass to answer any questions using Q & A pod
Do a Poll that asks some questions and asks about comfort level. Make the poll anonymous.

What activities would you include?
Showing the student how to do a for loop and then the students create their own.
Have student try one
Q & A session
Poll

What transitions are needed?
From Notes pod to Screen Share
to Q & A pod
to Poll Pod

How might you use the session as a formative assessment?
Poll the students

How would your session build a learning community among your students?
The Q & A

Communicate 2 - Discussions

Communicate 2 - Discussions

Answer in your blog:

1) What role or purpose do discussion forums serve in the online classroom and are they effective? 

They can be an assignment.
They are a way to get to know the students espiecally at the beginning of the course.
They are a way for student to get to know each other.
They can include topics that need to be cited thus have student practice their citation and copyright ethics.

2) How do discussion forums function as a teaching tool?

The teacher can start a discussion on a topic in which everyone has to answer. Students then see others response and have the AHA moments.
The teacher can then require a number of responses to other students.
Students can piggyback off each other
Teacher can then interject

3) How could they be used effectively and ineffectively?

Ineffective:
The could be ineffective if the students go off in a tangent that is not productive to the discussion.
Flaming could happen which would be ineffective.

4) What are some best practices for facilitating forums online?
Go over rules before posting the first Discussion.
Be specific about what you want.
Be specific about the topic.
Watch the Discussion and remove any insulting posts - contact user.
Do not allow attachments unless it is specific to the topic.

Communicate 2 - News Items

Communicate 2 - News Items

Answer in your blog:

As an online instructor, how do you plan to incorporate news items and announcements?
Weekly Announcements
List of links to important videos
Monthly News letter

I would use these resources to inform the students about available iClasses, AP News and any new resources available to them.  Students would receive this information in an email  and could subscribe so they would get this email as soon a the information was posted.


What resources would you reference to format news items?
Announcements or Communications page in LMS
Weekly emails

Example: 

Hello, class!
Can't believe it, we are now into Week 3! A lot happened in week 2 which we will build on as the course progresses.

What happened last week?

You spent the week choosing your job and started to think about what makes a good job for you personally. There
were many factors to think about. Salary is always on top of the list but it may not be the most important thing about
the job.  Look at Section 12.5 “Normal Distribution.”

This week's work will be used twice! It's a two-fer!! Milestone #1 is the first part of your Final Project. You will write it this week and then all you have to do for the final is do the suggested edits and insert into Final Project! These are due on  Sunday 1/27/19 to be considered for full credit.

1. Finish any work not done in week 2 first! You can still get 90% on those assignments and you need them to move onto
   week 3!
2. The Milestone One project is due this week:  3-4-1 Final Project Milestone One: Job Offer Comparison.
3. Students must select a “track” in this theme (NOT a job!) for the sake of comparing three job offers.
   The three tracks are Humanities, Communications, and Design.
   Wait a minute! Didn't we already do this.. well, in week 2 you did pick a track and some of you picked a job,
   but you just needed to pick a track. Now we are going to look at more details of the jobs. 
4. This milestone scaffolds directly to the final project, as you will base your job selection on the comparisons made
   at this point.
5. You will need to use the statistics found on the Bureau of Labor website (BLS.gov) to complete this milestone,
   specifically on the following page: Occupational Employment Statistics

Other helpful links at this site: 

∙ Wage data by state

Linda Noss

Communicate 2 - Homepages

Communicate 2 - Homepages

Answer in your blog: What information might you share as an online instructor through your classroom bulletin board?

• Welcome message
• Important phone numbers
• A doorbell to alert me that a student is waitng
• Links to classroom content

Create and post in your blog: 

Answer in your blog: What information might you share as an online instructor through your classroom bulletin board?
Create and post in your blog:  Create a sample Bulletin Board, which is student-centered, innovative, and adheres to the guidelines deliniated in this lesson. Have fun and be creative! Once completed, take a screenshot of the bulletin board and post the screenshot in your blog.

Communicate 2 - Ongoing Communication

Communicate 2 - Ongoing Communication

Reflect: Think about the examples provided throughout this lesson. Identify two highly effective methods of communicating with stakeholders. Utilizing the resources outlined, create an artifact for each of the two identified highly effective methods of communicating with stakeholders. These two artifacts should be included in your blog. Ensure these products are creative, informative, and adhere to FERPA guidelines.

Post in your blog: Two artifacts, one for each of the identified highly effective methods of communicating with stakeholders.

Example of an online weekly newsletter
Artifact #1

Week 6 Newsletter - what you need to know!

What happened last week? This week, you wrapped up the Week 5 lessons on affordability, budgeting and financial planning. I will be providing feedback this week on our 5-5- Final Project Milestone Two: Financial Plan and Budget assignment.   Please contact me if you have any questions about the feedback. Continue to check your email for reminders and updates about the course due dates.  Don't forget to go to the Course Content area of MyMathLab to work on the weekly assignments.  Check your Gradebook frequently to ensure that you have earned 100% for all of theweek's assignments. A preview for this week… This week we will focus on geometric formulas and shapes related to perimeter, area, surface area, and volume. During this theme, you will use formulas to solve real-life application problems. Have you ever purchased carpet for a room in your house?  Have you installed a new garden bed and calculated how much mulch to buy to fill the bed?  To determine how much carpet to purchase, you would calculate the area of the floor.  Before going to the garden supply store to buy mulch, you would calculate the volume of the garden bed.   At the end of this unit, you will complete your second graded discussion post: Problem Solving with Geometry.  The prompts in this discussion are intentionally open-ended and it is up to you to determine what other information is needed and how you would use that  information to solve the problem.  Please use the MAT-125 Discussion Rubric for guidelines on completing this assignment.         Please see Geometry Lesson videos below. This Week's Assignments: Due on 2/17/15 for full credit!  Finish Milestones#2 from last week if you have not passe it in! You can get 90% on this assignment and you will also use it in your final project! 6-1-1 MML HW: Polygons 6-2-1 MML HW: Perimeter and Area 6-3-1 MML HW: Volume and Surface Area 6-4-1 MML Week 6 Assessment 6-5-1 Discussion: Problem Solving with Geometry  My videos are available at http:://XXXXXX The first attempt of the Week 6 Assessment in MyMathLab is due on 2/15/15. The Week 6 Review and the second attempt of the assessment are due on 2/17/15 *Remember to score at least an 80% on the review to retake the assessment.

Artifact #2 Department Newsletter

Answer in your blog:
Why is ongoing communication in the online classroom important?
As an online teacher you do not see your students everyday. It is very easy to let it go or not feel connected to a students. Creating an ongoing dialogue with the students is very important. Things that might be ongoing are

Grades falling below passing
Checking in after a long student absence
Inquiring after a snow or weather event
monthly newsletters

How does the newsletter differ from mandatory communications?
These forms of communication are from Teacher to student so they can have information about personal experiences. Things like
"How was performing in Japan at the National Gymnastics championship. That must have been really exciting"
They might be about a question that keeps coming up or a change in due dates such as:

HI Everyone, I have been getting questions about grades with regard to myMathLab vs BrightSpace. So, I wanted to let you know about two idiosyncrasies:
When you are working in myMathLab and finish an assignment it takes BrightSpace about 24 hours to catch up. So, if you finish an assignment and immediately look at your grades in BrightSpace, you will not see an accurate accounting of your grade.
If you go into myMathLab and open an assignment but do not work on it, BrightSpace will put a 0 in the grade. Not to worry! When you do work on that assignment BrightSpace will 'catch up' within 24 hours.
I hope this was helpful. If you have any questions about your grade, as always, be sure to ask!

Communicate 1 - Communication Guidelines

Communicate 1 - Communication Guidelines

• Welcome email (generic for all courses) 

Hi XXX, I am Linda Noss, your new teacher.  I am very excited to work with you and get to 
know you! Please do not hesitate to email me if have any questions, concerns, or trouble 
with your work at any time. I teach Math and Computer Science at GaLearns and live in GA,
 so I am at Eastern Standard time. I have taught both online and in a face to face classroom 
so I am very comfortable with technology.

Here is a short introduction for you: http://XXXXXXX ( video would be created)

After viewing, do you have any questions about me that you’d like to ask?  I love sharing 
with my students, so please do not hesitate to ask me anything you’d like!

I hope you have a great day
Linda Noss

 School signature

• Personal notes versus mass communication to stakeholders (appropriate times)

Hello (Name)

It's date and with that comes this reminder that you have approximately one month remaining in your 
enrollment.  Make sure to check your end dates and if you have further questions please contact me.

The final weeks go quickly in any school term so make sure to reach out to your instructors if you 
need help or have any concerns!

Here’s to your success!

(SIGNATURE)

• Stakeholders

Dear [FIRST_NAME], This email is being sent to you to remind you about the end date of 
your [COURSE_NAME] course.

Your end date is [END_DATE]. Remember that I need a day to grade so you must be done a 
day before your end date.

If you feel you need more time then you must contact Student Services at XXX-XXX-XXXX. 
Remember that time added to Part A of the course will take time away from Part B of the 
course.

Best regards,

[SIGNATURE]

• School policies regarding communication

Hello [student and Parents], As you know we take the privacy of our student information and recors very seriously. In the last email you asked some information about your son/daughter that cannot be replied to in written communication. I would recommend a Skype appointment or phone call.

Please let me know which you would prefer and give some dates and times that work for you.
Thank  you
[SIGNATUERE}

• Tools available for effective communication
• Phone
• email
• Course announcements
• Video
• LMS content
•  Google voice

Communicate 1 - Identify Stakeholders

Communicate 1 - Identify Stakeholders

The stakeholders include the instructors, students, parents, and local school administrative staff utilizing the online platform.

https://create.piktochart.com/output/35461866-stakeholders

Communicate 1 - Communication Laws

 Communicate 1 - Communication Laws

Definition of Terms

• FERPA
• Academic Integrity
• Digital Citizenship
• Plagiarism
• Intellectual Property
• Copyright
• Telephone Consumer Protection Act

Answer in your blog:
How can one refrain from violating FERPA and TCPA guidelines in online communication?

• In each communication via email, blogging, texting, or phone communication the teacher must always think about how this would look or sound to someone other than the student or parent/guardian. 
• When talking about personal information or any information from the student records a phone call is preferred of a written communication.
• USE BCC! Group communication is for very general information about content, group due dates  or  information regarding something that would interest the whole group (such as change in due date, school closing or new policy).  BCC prevents other students from 'seeing' each other's contact information. 
• Written communication to an individual and their stakeholders should precise, informational. Personal information should be directed to a phone call or face to face meeting.

What methods could be employed to verify that copyright is not being violated?

• Lessons in copyright at the beginning of the course - these include examples of good and bad research methods.
• Teacher expectations - should make it clear that only original work is accepted, teach proper citation.
• Honor Code contract - Code of conduct contract.
• When violated - lessons in re-learning and emphasizing examples of good and bad researsh.
• Turnit in or similar software. Google searches of phrases of suspicious work.

Does copyright require that all work, images, words, and graphics must be original? No, for images there are a variety of rules outined in Creative Commons (https://creativecommons.org/)

Communicate 1 - Communication Definitions

Communicate 1 - Communication Definitions

Answer in your blog:
How have your individual communication skills changed with the innovations in technology?
Communicating online is very different than face to face. At first I made all the typical mistakes, too long, not to the point, asked to many questions in one email.
The first discussion board  in class was very fun for the students but not me. Allowing attachments caused funky pictures, videos and music clips.

Things I leaned:

1. Be very precise in what you are asking for - bullets help
2. Only ask one question per email  - the rest will be ignored anyway
3. Do not allow attachment unless that is part of the lesson
4. Get back to students as soon as possible
5. Calmy explain to irate student that emails take more than a few minutes to respond to
6. Set parameters to email use and stick with them

How have advancements in technology altered classroom communication?

• Yes, I can now 'talk' to my students from anywhere. 
• I can send out a general announcement as a evening reminder.
• Free response must be checked for plagiarism
• Copyright rules must be stressed and retaught often

Will these change further?

• Yes, I do believe that for students who like to communicate online but not in a F2F classroom. I will get to know them better.
• Copyright infringement is goimg to be more and more of an issue.
• Students will be more creative about the way they create their work.
• More types of communication will be expected of both the teacher and student.

Remember the humor
Online world is the real world
Keep in mind the context and the audience
Respect other's time
Be mindful of capital letter
Avoid 'flaming' or personal attack - do not engage

prompt - polite - professional

• Check often
• Read  carefully
• Emoticons
• Be precise

Disussion Forums - 

• Read prompt carefully
• look for length and/or quality
• Compose in word and then C/P
• Can use personal examples - relate concept to experiences
• do more than Ok or I Agree
• Refer to course reading
• Use quotes if taking directly with author, date and place
• Different regions represents different cultur
• look at commonalities to make connections

Email

• Clear subject line
• Be  direct and to the point - breif
• Reread before send
• Do not send on emotional times
• Clear signature line - name and course
• Be patient - it may be 24 hours
• Check FAQ Boards