Open Door Policy

Yes, we have an open door policy at the community college. Come one, come all, and yet when you get here, everything costs money. One way I've been trying to ease the financial burden for my students has been to use online textbooks. I'm collecting data from the students using anonymous polls about their experiences. Almost of all them like not having to pay for their books. Why bother writing a research question when you know the answer? In other words, I knew that's what they would say. I'm digging deeper, and there is still much to learn. More on that later.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rafa3r/2638842103/

Okay, readers from the ETMOOC community, I've been away for awhile. I didn't get to spend the time that I wanted to on last topic, but that's fine. I'm thinking of this blog as a way to record and share what my current thoughts are about all things connected to educational technology.
 

In the last two weeks, along with teaching my normal load, I've been doing the Quality Matters (QM) certification. And that, my friends, leaves little time for anything else. I'd like to focus more the QM in later blog posts, but I can say that I've learned a lot about course design, delivery, and alignment. Their focus on interaction--student-teacher, student-student, and student-content--is a move towards on-going professional development for higher education. A move, quite frankly, I'd like to see more of with regards to teaching. Subject matter training and development matters, but quality teaching is another facet of pedagogy that often goes ignored. 

So? Where did we leave off, ETMOOC? Well, first of all, I have to admit that I'm going to start to cheat on you. That's right. I've been telling my research students to "marry" their topics, and here I am cheating on my first MOOC.

I'm mostly just delighted that I can make that analogy in class and it includes all students in my class. Marriage equality allows me to use really bad metaphors about relationships when I teach research. I'm sure my students make fun of me. I would! I've joined "Introduction to Social Media" offered by Dr. Maria Andersen and Canvas Network. I logged on, but I haven't done anything yet. Since it's offer through Canvas, I want to see as many course designs as I can since my campus is moving to this LMS. Don't worry, ETMOOC. You've been my first love, and I'm going to see it through.

Here is latest ETMOOC the message posted last week:

Welcome to topic #4!

Over the next two weeks we hope to support your thinking and creativity around the very BIG and nebulous topic of ‘The Open Movement’. So what exactly is the Open Movement? Well, it’s not one thing. Rather, the Open Movement is an umbrella term that describes a number of overlapping and interrelated movements that, collectively, support the idea of a free and open society in the Arts, Education, government, computing/code, research, technology, medicine, copyright/copyleft, and other key areas. Over the next two weeks, we will  focus (mostly) on the Open Education piece of this movement but, as always, feel free to move well beyond what we provide.

My goal for this week will be to check out some of the sources and blog about them when I have the time. Time is tight. It is the last week of the quarter after all, and spring break is very close. Any idea that I can study where I'm promised "it's not one thing" and it's "an umbrella term" is something I know I'm going to love.