Session 2 (13/1)

Last week we had the introductory lesson and some exploration of the class wiki, and this week we learnt and read more about engaged learning, the definition, indicators and the dimensions of engaged learning, and the use of ICT in engaged learning.

We were broken up into groups for a short "discussion": What learning activities were most engaging in your primary or secondary school? There were 4 people in the groups and eventually we decided the share the role play idea with the class. During the sharing session within the group, I realised that my lessons in rimary and Secondary School were not exactly "engaged". A lot of times, it was more of a teacher-centred setting and basically the students just sit and listen to the teacher. There were group discussions that enable thinking and students' engagement but not a lot.

We had to visit a website on the indicators of engaged learning. We had to answer a questionairre sort of thing to find out how engaging our groups's learning activities are.

Aour group work, we had to work individually. We are supposed to visit a website with case studies of engaged learning in the classrooms. I chose Using Moodle to Create Virtual Classroom for Mother Tongue. Reason why I chose this is because I'm going to be a Chinese teacher in future, so I believe this will help me in future. Anyway, this activity helped me to identify the different factors of the dimensions of engaged learning, and what roles the teachers, students and ICT can play. Useful!

I also understand that engaged learning need not be fun, as long as it gets the students to think, and participate and contribute, it is engaging as well. I think many people tend to link fun to engaged learning. So this is not true at all.

Lastly, I now have a demo group.
Group members: Shi Ling, Jessie and I...