Well there has been a flurry of activity from all of us since my last entry, Canan and I did a quick review while she was in Sydney and found a few gaps – it has been great working with this group - I feel it has been truly collaborative- everyone has giving their time and commitment to activities and I think we are all proud of the results. The frustrations with the technology and moments of ‘what are we meant to do’ have long been forgotten and been replaced with a warmish glow (we haven't passed yet). I value the working relationships that have been established throughout this (and other) module

One of my projects for early 2007 is to imbed a Blended Learning Strategy across CGU that will set the standards for the future – this wiki is a fabulous resource and example for me to use.
A fantastic wrap up to the e-diploma courses!

Three weeks sick leave later! I’m back on board – I suspect I have been a contributing factor to us not completing all our tasks by now although I spoke to Canan about a few things while I was on leave but otherwise my tasks were static.

I reviewed all the pages to date – we have some great stuff in threre – No, I’m not really surprised – but although I had my doubts at times about how effective this kind of collaboration forum could work - I can really see it coming together – and feel part of even the bits I haven’t done!

Onward and upward!

After some dramas to actually obtain the materials …Did some reminiscing – no I mean testing with the Restaurant content and the travel content – there were some dramas with the links on the travel CD but the restaurant stuff was available through the LMS so that went more smoothly. Both materials worked well.

I love getting together face to face! The day was fairly laid back in terms of pace but the value in terms of having ABB to chat with and ask questions is always great. Anne really helped us get back on track in terms of ticking off what we had done – where we are heading and what needs to be done. I think one of the dangers with online collaboration is always going to be picking up on the points where activity has become more aimless than productive – and quantity outstrips quality… how long is a piece of string?. Our course has been structured to safeguard against that - which I am grateful for.

I enjoyed debriefing the presentation we attended at lunchtime- it made me realise just how far we have come and the advantages we have over a lot of other L&D professionals.

Anne has given us some direction to expand on bullets point and to move away from the general stuff and start being more specific about our audience, business needs and business drivers. A helpful push in the right direction!

We had another video conference meeting today and we really feel we are tracking well. We reviewed progress so far and confirmed we were all ok with our commitments for the next part.

A wiki win!
I am very proud of myself for having a play around with the wiki (reading some of the screen instructions helped) and figured out how to put attachment pictures in!

Mark has done a bloody great job at the look and feel I love it!

I’m feeling a certain level of frustration trying to navigate the wiki – not enough to be defeated. I somehow managed to lose a page altogether – maybe it will turn up. Fortunately it wasn’t too much drama to re type as I realised straight away.

Karla and I met as started to tackle our tasks, I like that our group naturally chose to collaborate on most of the tasks, we have an easy working style and are doing a good job of supporting each our with ad hoc phone calls. Karla and I easily reached agreement of how we would present our information

We had our first planning meeting today; we managed to score video conference and were able to be online as well. It meant that we could all see the same screen as we explore the wiki-world together. Until today I have to admit to some confusion around the whole wiki thing – I just hadn’t focussed my mind on it.
Now I can see the way forward to some degree. We talked about the tasks we need to complete and allocated responsibility across the group. I cheered when Mark said he would enjoy plating around with the “skin” and setting up the look and feel for the group.

I was pleased to see that all the entries alluded to the possibility of continuance with information about the next movie they wanted to see leaving the door open just a crack for Movies that Move You 2 (the sequel coming to a VC near you!)

Engagement in the interactions seems high with people commenting on their levels of enjoyment throughout the activities. I think one reason for this is that the topic was very accessible and didn’t require any research or additional information just past experience and opinion. This community could be moved forward into a book club type forum with the virtual commuters reviewing set movies and them discussing the same one. it's a bit like a series of water cooler conversations... maybe that can be my next one...

I think this activity would have really developed well if there had been more time before the next e-Tivity was posted. I think we may have found some trends as to the attributes of big screen movies as opposed to DVD.

We had another technical hitch with Megan logging into my page and not noticing that she needed to change her name – the result of a dodgy link methinks.

I'm starting to really be able to see the value in this kind of forum for generating and documenting ideas - the downfalls are that some people contribute more actively than others - but then i guess that's life!

The responses to this e-Tivity indicated to me that movies are a publicly personal thing. Mel refers to her choices as ‘Daggy’ or ‘sad’. A poor turnout this time can be attributed to
A) Me sending a link that didn’t work - one of the community emailed me to tell me but then never found the time to contribute a post. Therein lies a lesson about being competent with the technology you are using and how easily people can become disengages or demoralised when lost in cyberspace.
B) I think way that the discussion revealed things about your “at home self” may have produced a lurker – someone who reads the posts but doesn’t contribute to the discussion
As for the responses that did make it to air – I have to say I LOL at some of them. I think the quality of the responses has increased and I tried to encourage more two way communication between the group with the prompt - what does everyone else think – with some success.

This e-Tivity was great for me as I knew all the people and really enjoyed their responses. I was interested to detect an element of an on-line personality creeping in for some. I think this reflects what happened in the more public forums of this nature. I tried to encourage further responses by the answers I gave – with some success. I provided the netiquette links and an invitation to consider these – I chose links with telling title because I knew my audience would have come across this stuff before but wanted to reinforce the courtesy aspects in case people got carried away in the informal environment. Movies have the potential to be fairly emotive.

I was surprised to find that based on his movie choices my husband appears to be aspiring to a fantastic dancer or a raging serial killer - or perhaps a raging dancer and fantasising about a serial killer?

It was great that everyone respondsed so prompotly with such insightful commnets. I think I have benefited form hte frustrations they felt trying cto keep the momentum going when they were the moderator

I invited people whom I thought would generate some differing opinions and have different movie tastes

Now I have sent my first message! I have deliberately not posted instructions on how to post a reply as I believe my group are fairly savvy. My plan is to contact each participant if they haven’t responded in 2 days to understand whether is because of a technical difficulty or a lack of motivation! Thus I will know straight up whether to recruit some new members! Although I have to say that I am fairly encouraged by the speed of my first respondent, Canan (God love ‘er!)

I have started by virtual comunity. I have to say I was somewhat daunted by the task before starting but once I did I was surprised how easy it was. Not to say that I didn't face the usual handful of technical frustrations and mystifications that these new adventureds usually bring

Hello and well done!

Yesterday I finalised parts of the wiki that were incomplete and today the final final bits, and all is done now. I like it when things fall into place!

Reflecting back to when we started I was a bit confused about the whole wiki thing! But not anymore! I have really enjoyed working with the 'sustainers' everyone put in the amount of work they said they would and I feel I really learnt how to use a wiki page and work with a group online. The best thing about working in a group is making sure you finalise your tasks because so many people depend on you. Also I did note towards the second half of the project I found that we all worked even better together. I also like the project we worked on it was a good topic and I found I learnt quite a bit in the process. I also enjoyed the two workshops we had with ABB its always good to get together every now and then in a f2f environment to discuss the tasks and the course. Its also good that we get to seee each other because we are in different States. I find these sessions fun as we also get to have a laugh and socialise together where as when we are all online it is all serious information exchange.

All up we had 8 meetings either via teleconfernce or video conference. The rest of the communication was simply emailing each other when there was a question or picking up the phone and dialing! As for us Melbournians there was quite alot of discussion and private meetings as the three of us work within a 1.5metre radius of each other.

I hope all the members of the 'sustainers' felt the same as I did.

I look forward to working with you all again in the future.

OK we had one of our final meetings this Tuesday gone to work out as a group whether we had anything outstanding. There are a few bits and pieces that needs a little work. But we have decided all changes or additions will nee to be done by the end of this week as ABB will have the completed version by the 15th of Janyary as promised. All things aside I think we have done OK considering we have had illnesses, holidays, pregnancies, home renovationsnand general life and work committments etc going on and have found it hard at times to congregate. We are at the very last stage so thats great and then Liz and I go on holidays with clear minds and can focus on having a good time and not worry about not having completed our Wiki!

Hi All

Just wanted to say good job on the wiki it looks really good. I also love the song, i think i will make that my new ring tone to my mobile. Had some time and thought i would check out the wiki. Hope everyone is well and have a great new year.

Glen
(former Member of the schmiki wiki club)

yeah yeah I know I said I will speak to you all in 2007 but I went back into our wiki and made a few edits to the testing page. However, I was looking at the the rest of the pages and realised I havent put anything into the implementation page yet. I have it on a word document but havent transferred the details yet until my wiki partner is back from holidays!! Once Mark is back we will go through the content together and make sure we are both happy with it first..thats cool this will all be done by our set date!

Hi All,

Hope all is well? Been meaning to write for awhile now...We had a meeting a little while ago but unfrotunately a couple of members could not make it. We have had several discussions without being in a meeting to ensure all is well. I also spoke to Karla last week and she has put in the notes for our part of the testing and all is good. Everything seems to be pretty much on track. This morning Liz and I had a look through the assessments tasks and our wiki and it looks like we are on track. There are still a few questions we have which needs the input of our other members. So I have scheduled a meeting for the 9th of January when everyone is back from holidays to sort out any final details that may have been over looked. Other than that it is all looking good and I am quite pleased with the results.

So for now happy new year & talk to you all in 2007!

I am not sure whether this is too early to complete as we still have to do a final wrap up and tidy up of the wiki and the information contained in it. Lets see how I go and I will post an other reflection if required.

I am using the reflection model LINKS.

Learnt Skills
Instigated Skills
No Holding Back
Knowledge Gained
Something for the future

Learnt skills are using wikis, increaing my capability around the virtual collaboration piece and an understnding of the steps involved in putting a piece of e-learning out to an audience.

Instigated skills - Powerpoint and new ways of using it. wiki skills/virtual collaboration. Singing rap and and using a free software called Audacity to record and produce the file of the Wiki rap.

No Holding Back - My team was fantastic and everyone got into it and produced a terrific final wiki. I am very proud of all our efforts and work completed. I intend to do my utmost to incorrporate the use of wikis in the company ut only when the participants are read to exploit the virtual collaborative space.

Knowledge Gained - It is extremely important to understnd where people stand in the use of Syncronous and Asyncronous learing interventions and the use of collaborative tools. It is the learner or participant that is the key to designing your e-Solutions. Investigate, research feelings bout hat you are about to do before you do it.

Something for the future - Age appears to create adifference in how people want to learn on line. Look at our eval report and you will see what I mean. That has been an eye opener for me. Another thing, if we are to be a truely sustainable company then the increase use of wiki's is essential. The way information can be shared by this kind of software allows for the increasing opportunity to develop into the paperless office. Another?? Al the bells and whistles in the world wont make a piece of e-learning effective. One more - the learner is central to design of e-learning (and other learning) and must remain the focus at all times. There is another, PowerPoint heavy with pictures cnnot be easily loaded into edge, and that lacking a resource who could design in lectora gave the other team an edge over us!

Thanks ABB, I have enjoyed, stressed and appreciated the way you allowed us to take responsibility for our own learning. As learning professionals we need to be able to demonstrate the maturity to take on a learning and assessment opportunity like this and gain from it.

Woops forgot we lost Kelly as well. That is 22% of our team!!!!!

Well, a reflective piece was called for, so while I munch away on lunch, I thought I should get it all out of my head.
Although not the world's best blogger, I've got to admit, my real feelings did shine through along the way. I see some real patterns with me - procrastination, heavy workloads and time pressures, and a learning style as definately not an early adopter.
Yes, it's clear I need time to get comfortable with technology before I'll accept it. At first I resist, then I like to test A LOT and trial, I even try to break it before finally coming to a place where I like it, can begin to see benefits, eventually adopt it and finally recommend and encourage others to use it.
This year has really been a real journey into using different types of technology (blogs, wiki's, virtual classrooms), and finding where it could add value for leaners. As I've previously mentioned, I can't stand using technology just because it's there. It's got to have purpose, and add value, or I think it can in fact do more harm. The job now is to find these opportunities, and give it a go.

My major lessons learned that I must NOT forget:

* Informal learning is the best, most valuable kind of leaning. I now need to lead by example, and do it myself

* Encourage learners to find a buddy (thanks Shannon!) This helps remove the fear behind using new technology.

* Keep webinars really short, groups really small (no more than 6), and as interactive as possible. Webinars are also great for short information sessions. I've been using them and love them. It will take time to become really good at facilitating sessions, as well as being a participant, so I'm being kind and patient.

* People will often be afraid to release their thoughts and work "out there" to the world. Asynchronous collaboration can be really challenging for this reason. A lot of people especially don't like releasing 'unfinished work'. We certainly experienced this in our group as Creators on our Wiki. For us, I could see a huge difference once we'd all met, bonded, shared preferred styles, and agreed on some solutions.
I found using other forms of asynchronous communication was similar (with the added challenge mixed in being motivation) -UTSonline, my virtual community - Arsenic and Old Lace, and our work community on Edna - LPCOP.

* I'm not entirely convinced in the value of wikis in learning yet. I definatley feel a need to play in this space a lot more before I will expect learners to use it. I'm sure there's space there somewhere, but it's finding that right place and time, and group of learners. I'm sure when the time comes when working on a particular project it will come to me like a magical dream that a wiki is the perfect compliment to the learning solution. There might be something in this for the Graduate Orientation Program upgrade I was just given today...

* From then to now - I know my own comfort level has increased immensly. The whole course has been long, at times difficult, and always seemed to be there looming in the background, but now it's drawing to an end I can see oceans of value in what we all did.

It has been a time of huge growth for me. I've had a lot of fun along the way. I have to say our goup found the best way to overcome our fears of the wiki - humour. Just check out The Wrap Up by Da Gang if you can access it.
I haven't laughed so hard in ages.
Thankyou to my partners in crime for this - it's been such a pleasure in getting to know you all better on a personal as well as a professional level.
As Bec mentioned in her recent post, the levels of trust and respect between us has grown, and the group dynamics have been fabulous.
I'm so privaleged to work for a company that values learning so much as it does. I always felt like I had support whenever I needed it.

So in the interest of sharing, if you want to continue to hear about my reflective ramblings - here is a link to view my new blog:
[Click to view link]
So I may see you there.

It really is finally coming to an end. Been on annual leave for a few weeks, so once again have that scary feeling that I've dropped the ball again.
I've actually started another blog - being a reflective practitioner - to make me reflect more on my everyday learnings at work, and on specific projects. It will be ongoing.
I'm going to try to visit more regularly than this. We had a conference last week, and something that came out of it for me to action is the importance of being more reflective. That is where true learning occurs.

I will post my final reflective piece today which will cover my learnings throughout this course. I want to have a read of others in my group too, as I believe we're all at this point now.
Very exciting.
I'll also be trying working really hard to get my assessment in for last course - facilitate e-learning. I've done all the hard work, and just now need to write up my paper and submit it before the end of the year. Scary, as this isn't long.
B Back Soon.