After attending this module, I realised that without me knowing, I've already gained some new insights on the concept of engaged learning. Just like I've mentioned before, I always had the mentality that engaged learning means fun learning (But this misconception was cleared more than a month ago). Since then, I look at engaged learning from a different viewpoint and I'm glad to say that I gain a lot. Boring classroom discussions can be engaging as well, if it's challenging and requires a lot of thinking and analysing from the student's part. I would say that after my misconception on engaged learning was cleared, I gain more knowledge from those usual classroom stuff. Certain things that would make me feel bored in the past would now come to me as a new form of learning. I would not look at the activity as boring, but engaging. This way, I would then able to fully "engage" myself in it, and that is when I learn. It's true that we cannot learn when we keep letting that "boring" thought bothers us. We may be doing something that we think is boring, but we're only using our brains, and not our heart. However, if we look at it differently, we would using both our brains and our heart. That's a small difference, but it create BIG wonders. Well, at least, it's true for me. After I come to NIE, I realise that all my learning experiences are all very engaging and authentic. I think that very important as well, for learning to be "real". It furthers engage students in the learning process as they're exploring something that could happen in real-life. Students can also find more fun and become motivated to learn.
"Engaged learning allows students to participate in "real-life" activities through collaboration, exploration, and discovery with peers. Engaged learning projects do not focus on one subject, but the integration of many or all subjects. Assessment in engaged learning can be very diverse. Assessment should be real, continuing, and encouraging." (http://ozpk.tripod.com/000engaged)
That's so true.
How do you think your tutor has attempted to engage you in this course?
In my own opinion, I feel that my tutor has really done a pretty job in engaging all of us in this course. This is especially so when he incorporates and introduces new ICT tools and educational games to us when he teaches new concepts. Plain delivery of concepts could be boring, unclear or unengaging because most students would just listen and forget. But because of the ICT tools and games, it makes everything so interesting and easy to understand. That's because we have the hands-on experiences. It's our senses that are doing the magic. People will always learn better after they experience things themselves. This is a fact that will never change. I also think that the ICT tools make a very big difference to out learning process in this module. I guess it's because we're exposed to something new and fresh, that's why we're eager to try them out and hence the enthusiasm in learning and doing. To add on, during the earlier stages of the module, my tutor got us to do a lot of group discussions on engaged learning, pedagogical approaches etc, and provided us websites and videos links for better understanding. I thought that's so useful. Perhaps because I'm more of a visual learner (which I think most of us are), that's why I'm more able to learn more stuff when I'm exposed to all these stuff.
The ICT tools (introduced in this module, excluding those introduced during the demo sessions) that I like most:
- Mindmeister
- Prezi
I think Mindmeister is really good as it allows a lot of people to edit a mindmap at the same time. Although the functions are rather confusing initially, it gets alright after some exploring. It also allows users to see all the changes made in the past few days, and let us see who made which changes. It automatically arranges the newly-added points which makes the entire mindmap neat and tidy. It saves so much trouble for the users. Overall I think this tool is really nice and convenient. It's one of the better collaborative tools that's available online.
As for Prezi, it's definitely a more advanced presentation tool as compared to Microsoft Powerpoint. The zoom in and out functions really makes the whole presentation more visual, and is able to bring out important and interesting points more effectively.
For the educational games, I would say I enjoyed all of them, not forgetting how they could be so beneficial for learning and teaching as well.
Which of these strategies might you use in future and why?
As I would be teaching Chinese in future, I personally think that the ICT tools introduced in this module would help me make my lessons more interesting. I guess Mindmeister would help a lot if I get my students to make use of it when I give them mini projects or discussions. Of course, it's provided that my strategies are right before I can engage my students in those activities I plan for them. I would constantly work on this aspect. Frankly speaking, I've not thought about how games could be used for educational purposes. But now since I know, and have experienced them myself, I'm sure I would look for suitable games for my students. Language learning is not easy, especially so for the Chinese Language. Unless my lessons are engaging, interesting, fun and new, I'm sure my students would be more eager to learn.
The last point that I want to mention is that I learnt a lot from the demo presentations and the lesson idea assignment. It makes me think, analyze and evaluate how an ICT tool could be used in teaching and engaging students. That's going to help me for sure.
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