Update on my e-leaders

Did a ring around today as I feel I have been neglecting my e-leaders.
It turns out that they have all been flat out with end of year so had not missed me.

bestchance
Spoke to Kirsty and they are speaking to the powers that be about upgrading to private Label wiki. I do think that would be wise for them and am sure that if they get it they will take off flying next year.
Kirsty said that she has started her blog at last so that is good, too.
Nooraini has already been blogging

Holidays
I told Kirsty that I would be away but available by email if needed. She will pass the message on to Nooraini.
Both Noorainin and Kirsty are very enthusiastic and great to work with

Avenue NH
Rang to speak to Colleen but they have closed for Christmas already so will email her.
She had a very frustrating Elluminate session for the last EMR session she couldn't get in.
She is also very keen so will contact her when we get back and get her on track for the next semester.

Pines Learning
Jenny is flat out at present so we are going to meet online during January to get stuck into some work. Our new Office 10 has arrived so now we have no excuse! In no time at all Jenny will be producing Jings all over!
Jings are great but I think I still prefer iSpringFree I feel I can control it better. But she is keen to use Jing so it will be good to see how she goes with it.

An aborted BBC Session

I know what I would like to do to BBC with this pen knife - funny it should feature on the front page of their site!

How frustrating! Was really looking forward to our final session for the year with all the ementors and echamps in BBC. However, BBC had other ideas and would not play ball. I could get in and then it did the St Vitus dance and froze my sound and text. After rebooting a thousand times and re-entering the room a thousand times I gave up. Never has that happened to me in the classroom before. I am beginning to feel relieved that we have not yet been upgraded to the new version!

It got me thinking though, how  new users of technology must feel each time they attempt something new. I am what I consider a fairly experienced BBC facilitator and the room was full of gurus and between us all we could not get it to work. I am sure I would eventually lose interest in learning about new technology if each time I tried to enter the classroom it misbehaved to the extent it did today. I am reflecting on my feelings when I could not get in. How did I feel?

I was definitely frustrated, angry and perplexed but also despairing because I had organised a great chair picture and could not use it, could not speak to anyone so felt completely isolated and cut off. Only one person answered my frantic SMS's and I consumed a whole Twix bar in frustration! I really felt as though I was missing out on what was being discussed and  I still have no idea whether they decided to abandon the session or keep going with the few who seemed able to participate. If they kept gpoing then what did I miss out on? No doubt a message will go around - perhaps in the Moodle about what we will do next. If I was feeling all those emotions, it reminds me that when a new learner has difficulty accessing the classroom, how much more frustrating, perplexing and isolated must they feel? Makes me even more determined to keep my mobile phone next to me at every session I faciitate so that the person can at least know that I am aware of their predicament and can let them know other ways they can access the information.

As my son said on FB today "It could have been a better day...."

Being an e-champion so far has been ....

a great opportunity to work within an inspiring, helpful and welcoming community of practice, and it's been lovely to meet and work with Lynne and Christine and the Eastern  eleaders. I love seeing the way that people light up when they understand how something works and are beginning to see the potential and get excited about it. Their enthusiasm is contagious! It's also been good to meet the e-leaders face to face in their own environments. It can be easy to forget the different contexts that people work within - and I hope that I've been able to help the eleaders find ways of using technologies that are really relevant to their everyday work.

I think the Moodle and Ning are great resources - and a fabulous handy source of really useful tips.It's great to be part of something that has such a collaborative spirit. I've felt that from day one. Both Christine and Lynne have been very helpful - always ready to give information and advice as I have been finding my way around this e-championing business. Both are inspiring in their different ways - Christine for her constant capacity, energy and enthusiasm for learning new things, and Lynne for her warmth and for her calmness in juggling so many things at one time :) So thanks to them both - I'm really enjoying being part of their team.

One e-leader's Blackboard diary

Some good feedback here (taken from blog entries), and one or two things we can improve on :)

Sep 26

Coordinator emailed Blackboard Collaborate times suggestion - Wed. 5th Oct 3p.m.: 4p.m.

Went to ementor and looked at Blackboard powerpoint and downloaded the PDF.

Will try to practice getting into the Blackboard before the actual session

Sep 29
Wed: Loaded Java and Elluminate on number 13 then tried Coon.Hou Online Classroom using just headphones.  -  Hooray, had no problems! Feel quietly confident for next week.

Oct 6
Blackboard session- e Learning:  3 moderators, 5 participants.
Was quite comfortable using the site.
One suggestion - it would make it a lot easier on the ears if the microphone use could be like the hands up.  With hand up you are given a number and have to take your turn.  With several mikes on at the same time it got a bit hard on the ears. I tried using the laptop's microphone but the others could not understand me - so, no good. Typing was no problem.
In the session we were shown around the program site, requested we create a blog and it was recommeded that we become a member of ACE Learning.Lyn will email a Doodle to determine a time and date for our next session.

Nov 7
Ended up joining Blackboard late as could not remember how I got into the classroom last time and my notes were at home not at the office.  Thank goodness Gloria sorted me out.
During the Blackboard session I liked the way we were walked through the steps to get to a point instead of just being told how to get there.

Nov 14
I did enjoy todays Blackboard session.  Congratulations to the e champions for keeping it together whilst some of the participants were having audio problems.  The Pictionary was fun and I'm beginning to like the polling procedure.
In the beginning I would have said why use Doodle when it would be just as easy to email.  But after being shown through it today, yes I can see that it does more than a mere email.

Dec 7
2 criticisms first -  I start logging on around 10 -15 min. prior to make sure I'm ready to start on time.  Then it seems it takes approx. 15 - 20 min. after start time before the session actually commences.
The second one is that we will have to get better at switching on and off the mikes. If more than one is on it echos horribly.

Sorry, now that I have got that off my chest, I really enjoy the icebreakers and polling.  I follow your polling instructions and feel I may be getting the hang of it.
There are so many different sites now that provide the same subject (e.g. avatars) but with subtle differences that at times it gets confusing as to which one to use. I guess it really boils down to try and then 'your choice'.
I did get enthused enough to go and look at the Tagxedo site and feel it could be a good tool for our teachers and tutors to use.  Will look at Voxopop also to see what that offers.

Reflections on the WALP e journey

At WALP Trish and Gloria have been making great progress. I first met these two enthusiastic ladies at the face to face meeting we all had at Coonara to get everyone started. I think they left there bubbling with ideas. Not long after, I met up with them at Amaroo. The amount of great work and ideas they manage to achieve squeezed into their tiny office is impressive!

Getting focused on just one project idea to start with took us all a bit of time. For me, it was a good reminder of how easy it is to fall into the trap of using techie jargon and assuming that people know what I am referring to when I use words like blogging even if they might not know exactly how to do it themselves.

It was also a reminder of how hard it can be for the e-leaders to try and define a project at the beginning without having a clear idea of what techie options are out there and how they might be used to achieve their objects. Gloria and Trish had already given some thought to what they wanted to do. Their problem was which one to choose, how to demystify the technologies and build their idea into an e-learning project. Gloria puts it well:      

Claire had the unenviable and very difficult job of finding what we wanted to gain from this project. Difficult, because we were not really sure ourselves exactly what was involved. ..When we presented our ideas, she broke into a foreign language  of bloggies, foogies, loggies, doodles, noodles and poodles. At last she mentioned something we all understood - the WIKI!!!

Now we were on safer ground. Gloria and Trish already knew about wikis and the time it takes to get them off the ground and people to use them. They had set one up for their teachers and valiantly championed it for two years before the teachers reluctantly joined it. The great thing about Gloria is that she asks lots of questions. How, she wondered, could understanding what a wiki is possibly help them with their proposed new digital photography course. I like the way Gloria described the way they began to find an answer to her question:
“Claire persisted - she questioned, delved, prodded till finally as if the sky had fallen directly onto our heads we were hit by a great idea! Keep developing our photography course but instead of delivering it directly to the public, trial it with the teachers. Even better, set up a wiki (for it) and the teachers could then collect ideas etc from this and at the same time develop their confidence in using the teacher wiki. The natural progression would then be that the teachers pass on this information to their students and this could be incorporated into their language courses. Suddenly things were becoming clearer. I raced home and began to set up a simple photo wiki. Trish and I will develop this as we develop the plan for the course."

One of the best things about ementoring is seeing the way that people are prepared to give new things a go. Gloria again:
    " We are still not out of the woods yet but the path is becoming a little clearer.     At least now I am having a go at the blog. Not sure why though yet!!! "

Blogging is new to both of them. Trish has been quite prolific, clocking up 27 entries since September - must be a record! For me, it has been a great way of following her progress on this e-journey. She had a clear incentive for getting involved in the project:
“I was eager to have those mysterious internet sites demystified (skype, facebook, blog etc) so that when students rabbited on about them I could perhaps answer a few questions.”

A couple of days later she had already had a look at iSpringFree, Jing, Doodle, Moodle, CoolText and Photostory, and by the next week she had also visited the ementor site and found her way to C4LPT site. I was impressed!  Trish researched options for her students to use for storing photos and opted for Windows Live Photo Gallery because most new computers come with it preloaded and it’s easy to use and has been working on finishing the design of her new course and beginning to upload material to their wiki.

End of term reflections - Wavlink

I started putting something together for my e-champ report for Lynne - getting to you very soon Lynne :) - but soon found that I was writing a longer and more reflective view - so thought I'd improve on my blogging absence of recent weeks and write something on each of my projects here.

Starting with Wavlink - where I was again today. Judy was on holiday with her family in China at the start of the project – so she has had a slower start – but we are making good progress now. As Judy said in the last elluminate session, she felt she was a bit techno phobic, and participating in the project is helping her to gain confidence and to feel more at home on the screen. I think one of her frustrations is that she likes to be able to do everything easily and quickly, and when the technology doesn’t seem to be playing along with this, she gets exasperated. At the same time she is enthusiastic about becoming more technically savvy, and is determined to master these technologies – as much for her own personal development and future work options post retirement – as well as for increasing the technical capacity and usage at Wavlink itself. Judy has a daughter who is a keen (prize winning) blogger – and that’s one of the incentives for Judy for learning about new techie things – keeping up with her daughter.

Judy has been giving a lot of thought about how to best meet the needs of her students. To date the focus has been on basic computer literacy rather than elearning . They run self-directed pre-accredited computer courses, and as Wavlink is a disability-focused centre, their students obviously have special needs. Most of the students are adults with intellectual disabilities, and come as part of the HACC programme. Others have Acquired Brain Damage. Writing can be difficult for them. She told me about one guy, for example, who was able to write but for each letter in a word had to work his way through the alphabet starting at ‘a’ because that was the only way he was able to remember how to spell out a word. He couldn’t remember the name of a letter without going through this ritual. This was obviously a slow process, so he had been learning how to prepare what he wanted to say offline in Word, and then how to cut and paste it online.

Wavlink has one paid computer tutor and between one and three volunteer tutors at any one time. Judy is very keen to see her students use computers to progress their literacy skills – and the tutor has been working with the ABD students to raise their levels to be able to use Facebook and to play basic matching games on the computer. The students are beginning to get the hang of Facebook – but the text-based nature of it is a bit of a barrier to them.

Judy was inspired by a project she saw – or heard about - in the Western suburbs. This was a nursing programme for adults with disabilities which was using Skype to help the adults reconnect and re-engage with their families. She had been impressed by how well this worked and by the way that as a result the technology became a real and authentic part of the adults’ lives. I think this is the kind of direction or result that Judy would like to achieve in the e-leader project at Wavlink. It made me think that another time a good way forward for starting these projects might be to have a ‘toolbox’ of ideas to hand that are specifically related to different student and tutor needs – eg ideas for things to do with people with disabilities, or youth, or ESL students; or 10 ways of getting tutors on board with elearning or, using a wiki etc – so that there is a kind of map to help the e-leaders link the tools to the outcomes – or what they want to achieve. Ken, my husband, went to an inspiring conference the other week for the 2011 International Day of People with Disability on IT enables: life, choice and participation – so I gave Judy some of the contacts he picked up which looked like they might be interesting in terms of this project.

We’re still in the process of refining exactly what Judy’s project will be – our discussions centred around Skype – supporting tutors and students around the process of installing and using Skype, and building on the students’ basic skills. She also wants to look at mailchimp, and ways of drawing volunteers and tutors into the idea of elearning.

But in the meantime we’ve been focusing on building up her confidence levels with some of the technologies. She has also been practising or experimenting at home with facebook – and thinks she has made some progress there. She made the comment today – that there wasn’t really any time for her to do any learning herself during the typical day – there was so much to do, and shutting herself away to get on with some e-practising wasn’t really on. I think we’ve all shared that problem – how do you schedule your technical upskilling into an already packed day? Perhaps it’s something we could talk about in one of our elluminate sessions next term – get some tips on how to make time for it.

Judy set up a blog last time I was there, and at home added a photo to her profile which was great. Today we went through all the tabs on her dashboard – settings, formatting etc – and I think she felt a lot more au fait with it after that. Next time we meet, we are going to look at Wordpress – which is what the Wavlink website is based on. I’m going to help her upgrade and do the drop down menus.

Judy also came to the last elluminate session – which was great – and seems to have found it a positive experience – at least she felt comfortable enough to declare her techno phobias! And she really is keen to pick up the skills and can see the potential. Her first entry on her blog was:

Today is a great day as have a blog where I can now keep you abreast of what I am learning and the progress that I am making on this fantastic journey.

Judy's blog is here: http://wavlinkelearner.blogspot.com/

We had a good turnout to our last online session for 2011 - hurrah!

It was great to see so many people turning up. Some were new to the sessions believe it or not??%%^^$$!! Well anyway, at least they showed up and appeared to get quite a bit out of it. We started with a short ice-breaker then a report from each of them about where they were up to with their projects. (Note to myself - tricky to facilitate and and scribe onto the whiteboard at the same time. Good idea to ask Christine to take over facilitating whie I concentrate on scribing which she did like the champ she is). Most projects have got themselves under way which is pleasing. One participant who freely confessed to being terrified of technology was still hanging in there and practising - bless her. Would rather have 100 people like her in the project who are working hard to get rid of the fear factor than one person who can do it but doesn't! Most are also getting into blogging which is great. Should have some nice quotes for our report.

We moved onto polling - Ros from Japara volunteered to do the poll which she managed very well. When questioned about how it was for her she said "It seemed to be quite straightforward". Then we did a short report back from ConVerge11. I had forgotten that Janine from NRCH had also been there so thanks to Christine for reminding me to give her a turn to report on what she went to. I coud not make out what she was saying as her audio was pretty muddy but hopefully it was clearer to others. Sounds like Ian Knox was a hit with everyone! Interesting coomment from Janine when asked if she felt that ConVerge was a useful conference for her to go to. She responded that she thought it would have been better if she had known more - some of it was a bit over her head. Well, hopefully by next ConVerge - they will!

The next section was on exploring ideas for next year. I had created some slides with suggestions of tools we might like to look at as a way of letting them know what was around as most participants do not seem to have much idea beyond Facebook and Twitter. There was quite a good discussion around the tools and when asked if there was anything else they would like to explore there was dead silence so I guess that means more that they do not know what there is available to use rather than they do not wish to explore anything!

I also suggested that early in the year we have another session on facilitating in BBC as there were some new people there who had not had the benefit of our session earlier in the term. There are also some more tools in the classroom to explore such as the breakout rooms, webtours, file sharing and maybe videos.

What did I learn about facilitating this session?

• As already discussed - use another facilitator to scribe, don't try to do both
• If using the computer at work, remember to turn off my mike after speaking as it seems to give off dreadful echo - or, conversely, do it from home :)
• I could have used either Claire or Christine to watch the text chat for me and let me know when there was a question or pertinent comment. I missed all of Trish's comments because my text disappeared there for a few minutes.
  
• Try not to talk over people
• Try to persuade people to come into the room earlier before the session to set up audio. The session started at about 4.13 rather than 4 pm because of having to assist people to set up audio

Lots of things went well:

• The ice-breaker was fun
• The polling went well - talking Ros through it was successful
• Giving participants a chance to report back on their projects gave them an opportunity to have their say and helped us get to know them better
• I learned some interesting information about presentations I wasn't able to attend at ConVerge11
• An hour is a pretty good length of time for one of these sessions
• Talking about the tools got some discussion happening
• The format that we have worked out for these sessions seems to work well.

Now, over to my next BBC session in 5 minutes!

Another disappointment & some good stuff!

Had a sinking feeling when I phoned Mulgrave this morning to check that our face-to-face session was still happening this afternoon. I was right - the manager was not able to dredge up any support from her ESL tutors or anyone else and was not prepeared to do it herself so that's the second of my organisations that has bitten the dust. Is it me? Better change my deodorant lol!

On a happier note, I phoned the rest of my eLeaders this morning for a supportive chat and found that Japara are definitely ready to set up their wiki and Ros wants to do it on her own with phone feedback if necessary after my initial discussion and planning session with her. I have organised to be available for chat next Monday if she needs to contact me with any technical questions. Its fantastic that she is having a go on her own - I am proud of her! That is definitely a goer!

Rowville are definite goers as well - slow to start but full of great ideas and keen as mustard! They are having a meeting tomorrow to discuss their preliminary ideas about their wiki and to firm on what they want on it it, links, images etc. I am seeing them again next Tuesday to walk them through how to set it up. They will be quick to learn. They have set up a blog but are having trouble accessing blogger.com at work. They sent me an invitation through my coonarahouse account and that didnt appear to let me in so am waiting on them sending me an invite to my other gmail account.

I also phoned Sue from OELP and am waiting on a response from her, however, she is miles ahead on her wiki although I don't hink she has set up a blog yet. Must get out the whip!

So that's it as far as my three remaining are concerned - not a bad effort - one wiki set up, two wikis about to be set up and two lots blogging. I am also going to show all the staff at Rowville how to use BBC when I am there next Tuesday. They don't feel brave enough to come online without extra help except for Lisa and she is usually on her day off when have our sessions.

On the Converge front - I have sent my photo to Christine and am currently putting my slides together to send to Claire. Have entered 22nd Nov as the deadline to send them off. Must make sure I remember to do that to give Claire time to put them all together. Have plotted some time at Coonara tomorrow afternoon to try and rustle up some signs for the project. It will probably be the last time I get time between now and Converge unless I go in and do it at night - then again I am working most of those nights online anyway lol! About to go online for the ementor session with Josie so will blog again soon. Cant keep up with Christine - she is such a prolific blogger - will have to lift my game!

Blogs

I am very pleased as I now have 5 e-leaders blogging!
Next challenge will be to keep them blogging. Positive feedback so far.

Sorry!

I must remember my headings :)

Never too late to learn - Elluminate Session 4 November 2011

And here's another great comment from Nooraini:

Never too late to learn - Elluminate Session 4 November 2011

I'm not afraid to admit that I am technologically challenged at the best of times but this morning's session was amazing and I learnt a great deal from everyone who participated today. I am a novice and had no idea you could present all sorts of things on wikispaces ie assessments, handouts, messages, discussion forums etc. It's been a real eye opener because of the possibilities for trainers, students and the rest of the organisation's staff. Being able to see how Pines and Coonara have used wikispaces helped enormously as did Lynne's and Christine's suggestion about how to motivate trainers and staff to start using this valuable tool.

I am really glad I took time out to participate on my day off. It was amazing!

I love seeing people be so inspired. Doesn't it make it all worthwhile?

Hi ladies.

Thanks for a good Converge planning session - I think it will work out well.

Just been looking at Trish's blog - here's a nice bit of feedback on the last eluminate session from her:

"During the Blackboard session I liked the way we were walked through the steps to get to a point instead of just being told how to get there."

And also a nice one to show some of the frustrations when she was having a go at the first one - her first time I think, but I might be wrong there.

"Blackboard session- e Learning: 3 moderators, 5 participants.
Was quite comfortable using the site.
One suggestion - it would make it a lot easier on the ears if the microphone use could be like the hands up. With hand up you are given a number and have to take your turn. With several mikes on at the same time it got a bit hard on the ears.
I tried using the laptop's microphone but the others could not understand me - so, no good.
Typing was no problem."

Successful Day

Avenue Neighbourhood House
Today I went to see Colleen at Avenue Neighbourhood House for wiki training.
Blog
Collen had created her blog and had created one post but she didn't know how to give me access to it. We solved that problem and also edited the blog post to add a picture.
Wiki
Colleen did not have access to their wiki as the administrator of it was away so we used the wiki I had created this morning for just this sort of occasion.
We covered:
- creating new pages
- inserting Table of Contents
- using heading levels
- inserting text
- uploading and inserting files
In Presence of Celebrity
I was delighted to discover that Colleen is the new President of ANCHA. Well done, Colleen!
She now wants to create a wiki to use in her new position. This will give her lots of wiki practice to enable her encourage her trainers to use wikispaces with their learners.

bestchance
besstchance was my next stop.
Blogs
Nooraini had created her blog but didn't know how to give me access to it. We dealt with that first.
Kirsty had not yet created her blog so I watched over her shoulder while she created her blog and gave me access. So blogs are set up with one ready to go and the other already in use. Well done, bestchance!
Wiki
Nooraini created a new wiki for information for trainers.
She did a good job:
- create new wiki
- create new pages
- inserting Table of Contents
- using heading levels
- inserting text
- creating a table
- uploading and inserting files
Kirsty watched Nooraini doing these things so she will be able to do them all too.

Reflections
I was pleased with what we achieved today - 2 RTO's with e-leaders setting up their wikispaces with their blogs already on the go.
The only problem was that I had anticipated spending an hour with each of the centres and ended up spending a lot more time. Next time I need to watch the time more closely.
It was good day

My Week - Christine

I have had a busy week, but I am not sure what I was busy doing!
On Monday we had our second Eastern Region online session. As Lynne has already said we had a disappointing turnout
I had my second TAELLN401A class (I'm a student in this one) on Tuesday evening. Only one Saturday class left for this now and we have to submit part of our assessment next Saturday. I am enjoying this class.
On Wednesday I started a new Computers for Beginners class - that went well, it is a small class of complete beginners.
On Thursday I had a Medical class - so what on earth did I rush about busily doing for the rest of the week??
Friday found me panicing and desperately trying to contact my e-leaders to set up f2f wiki training sessions. I have a wiki training session with Nth Ringwood on Wednesday 2 Nov, one with Avenue the following Tuesday 8 Nov. Will see Jenny at Pines on Wednesday and couldn't contact Bestchance so have emailed them.
Also I have had overseas visitors so hasty cleanup and hiding of books, papers, etc. Result is I can't find my e-Mentor project binder with all my interview information in it!!! Not happy, Jan!

Weekend
Spent the weekend at the beach. it was lovely to get away. Weather wasn't brilliant but managed to get some walks in without blowing away or getting drenched. Photo is of pelicans I cencountered on a walk on the beach.

Ementor, EChamp online meeting

We had our online session to try to come to grips with how the rest of the online sessions for the year should be scheduled. I surprised myself by realising that we only had 3 sessions left! Important that we make them count I think. A few technical hitches with lots of echo in our ears and Claire had some trouble getting her audio organised. Finally hit on the right combination so hopefully that will work for the rest of our sessions.

I really like our spirited discussions and free sharing of ideas and ability to critique each others' suggestions in a helpful way. I think we have a great team! We got the format for our next session down - mostly built around wikis again as nearly all of our eLeaders appear to want to make wikis. We will showcase a couple of Class wikis to give people ideas. I think this is important so that those who are creating wikis for their organisation can see what else they can do for their organisation and hopefully spark off a few ideas of their own. Quite a few of the eleaders have expressed an interest in learning about the Doodle so that will be on the agenda for the meeting after next. Christine has volunteered to demonstrate that during the session. Will leave the final session blank so that eLeaders can put in their own suggestions of what they want to explore.

Christine has suggested that the Nth Ringwood people might be up for using the poll this session. I suggested that we make all of the participants facilitators so they can see what the pollsters are doing and so learn through the process.

Even though Wednesdays seemed to be the most popular day selected by people to have the sessions, as only 5 out of all the eLeaders have filled it out and other people have indicated that Wednesday is not a good day for them, we therefore decided to change days for each of the sessions otherwise some people would not be able to attend any. Hopefully I will be able to send out the schedule today to give eleaders plenty of time to put it into their diaries.

I visited Rowville Neighbourhood House yesterday. They are keen to have a wiki website . I suggested that they start with that and include a tutor in our sessions so that he/she gets an idea of what wikis can do and to see any other tools we showcased during the project. They agreed that step 1 would be the website wiki and step 2 would be to set up a tutor resource page with tutor-only login. They expressed reservations about tutors participating as they were sessional and I pointed out that most tutors anywhere were sessional and that to get them to use the wiki there has to be a "what's in it for me". That would be that they do not have to make a trip to the centre to pick up paperwork etc - they can access it from home. They can also communicate with other tutors and staff via the wiki and this may help them not to feel isolated. They agreed that this might be the carrot that might lure them to participate.

Their ESL tutor will also be working at Mulgrave so I said that might be an advantage as I was hoping that Mulgrave might do something with ESL students as their project. I am visiting Mulgrave this afternoon so will wait on developments there.

Thinking about what and how we will showcase our projects at Converge. Probably a powerpoint of some sort - if I get time maybe I can create some sort of digital story - but that is probably a pipe-dream at this stage! OELP will have their wiki ready to showcase - at least in fledgling stage to demonstrate something. I am also hoping that Rowille will be up within a week or two and maybe Japara. Hopefully some of the other eleaders will have something to show as well.

Its now late afternoon and I can report on my trip to Mulgrave Neighbourhood House. I knew it might be a bit of a challenge, owever, the challenge came from the ESL teacher rather than the person I was expecting it from! The Co-ordinator just wanted a facebook page set up. I suggested that this could be done as part of the project but that it would really benefit the learners and the house if a small project could be done with the ESL students. MH, once she had worked out that she would get FB as part of the package came on board and was very supportive of the idea of using some form of audio with the ESL students. She even spoke about it being a direct result and lead on from the CALD learner project that was done there in conjunction with AMES and Coonara without me having to say that was why I thought it was a good idea! The ESL teacher was very hesitant and did not really want her students doing anything online. She was very fearful of disclosing anything about them in a public forum. I suggested that she could ask for volunteers and that as they were adults, they could say whether they wantde to be part of the project or not.

In the end, I introduced the topic of podcasts as something she could do for them - individualising podcasts that they could take home. Didnt go anywhere near saying that they could be uploaded onto a wiki - they are not ready for that. I just suggested they could be put on CD, memory stick or ipod and she seemed amenable to that idea. That is what it has ended up with - MH will contact a couple of other ESL tutors and ask if they would like to be involved and will set up another meeting with me and them to go over the plan and see if they can add any new ideas. I left it there but was happy that MH was very open to the idea and that she would support it. I am imagining that it will be very slow to get off the ground but will plod on with them. At least they are agreeable to being involved!

Eastern region BBC - No 2

Yesterday we held our second BBC session for our region.

My feelings
I felt that we had a good plan and had done our preparation well. thanks, Lynne for the presentation. Very disappointed that only 2 RTOs attended - sometimes you wonder why you bother! But of course, we all persevere - must be because we love doing it!

Session Plan
- welcome
- icebreaker - another BBC skill to engage participants
- PD session - intro to wikis: this was designed to introduce e-leaders to wikis and as most of our e-leaders are admin we showcased the wikis we had created for admin, committee and tutors. This we hoped would give our e-leaders ideas to build on for starting to plan their own wikis.
- Poll to check how our e-leaders were going with the task set at the last session (set up a blog). We also used it to start sharing the facilitation with our e-leaders and Jenny from Pines ran the Poll and did a great job with it as I knew she would!
I did a file transfer of the How to Poll instructions I had created - another BBC/Elluminate option demonstrated.
- Question Time: there were no questions as one e-leader knows what her next steps are and the other has not yet created a blog.
- Ask for a volunteer to share the facilitation in the next session: we forgot to do this but I will email Janine from Nth Ringwood and ask her to run our Poll for us.

Objectives
We are trying to:
- demonstrate best practice in BBC/Elluminate
- involve e-leaders in sharing facilitation to give them experience in a supportive environment
- use the regular sessions to provide a PD session as well as checking on progress and being alerted to any problems arising which we may be able to solve at the end of the session or may need more one to one attention.

Reflection
We provided a good session that 7 of our RTOs did not attend. I believe that we have our session format right - a good mix of new skills and reviewing tasks completed or attempted.
Our next challenge is to get our e-leaders on board - perhaps we need to have a chat with Carole as she seems to be able to get her e-leaders to attend all of her sessions.
Lynne, Claire and I need to get together to make our plan for the PD sessions till the end of the year and put it on our regional wiki. I think that will help if our e-leaders actually realise that they will miss out if they don't attend.
I really was disappointed and have had feedback from one of my e-leaders that she was sorry that we had done so much preparation and then had such a poor attendance.
We must hope for better attendance at the next session. I think that now we are aware that we may have attendance problems we need to make sure that we start on time in respect of the e-leaders who have attended and their time - we waited for 15 minutes hoping that more would arrive!

Positives
Jenny did a brilliant job facilitating the Poll - I was very proud as she is one of my e-leaders and a friend.
As she logged in early and was made a moderator she also had a chance to practice the Poll, play with the ppt slides and some of the other tools available to moderators - this was good as Jenny will need to facilitate in BBC for her project.
Nth Ringwood managed to talk this time! I had recommended to them that they obtain headphones. They still have 3 people trying to use one computer, last session they had 4! I had recommended that they use a computer each so I will have to find out what happened there. Great that they are attending.

My Week - Christine

Started the week by arriving home from the beach - would have been nice to stay there but sometimes real life does interfere!

1st Interview
Tuesday found me at BestChance Training interviewing Nooraini. She had no idea what the project was about. Kirsty was supposed to be at the interview but she was unfortunately double booked.
So, Nooraini and I had a lovely chat. They have a wikispace but did not know what sort it was.
Wikispaces
Nooraini is the VET coordinator and she wants to create a wikispace for tutor resources. She knows nothing about wikispaces - so, another beginner for wiki training!
Interactive Whiteboards
Bestchance have interactive whiteboards so the second aim is to learn to use these and encourage use by all tutors.
I suggested that if Nooraini learnt to use the interactive whiteboard and used it at the next tutor meeting she would be demonstrating use to the tutors attending the meeting. They also have one tutor who uses intractive whiteboard so I suggested that she could ask that tutor to demonstrate how she uses the whiteboard.
Google Docs
Kirsty had included Google docs in her wish list of training. But Nooraini didn't even know what Google docs were so I don't know yet what Kirsty's intention was.

2nd Interview
Thursday morning found me at the Avenue Neighbourhood House chatting with Colleen Saunderson.
Colleen had not much idea of what was happening but Sally had given me a good idea of their needs at our regional f2f meeting so this formed a basis for our discussion.
Wikispaces
The Avenue have a wikispace but once again didn't know what sort it was. They are keen to set it up to upload assessment tasks and class resources.
Google Docs
Once again Kirsty had said that they need to learn about Google docs but Nooraini didn't know what they were.
Tools to Engage Youth
They have recently been awarded a grant to set up something for youth and would like to become familiar with tools that may be used to engage youth. I suggested some of the tools I trialled with my recent VCAL group - especially iSpringFree and possibly Jing.

3rd Interview
Thursday afternoon found me in the computer room with Jenny at Pines Learning. Pines want to set up a Cert III in business administration for blended delivery - a combination of f2f, self-paced and online.
Wikispaces
I confirmed with her that she wanted to use their private label wikispace and suggested that she have a go at creating a new wikispace. Jenny has good wiki skills but not setting up skills.
She is going to plan how she wants the wikispace to function and look.
Other Tools
I showed Jenny some of the resources that she has access to (other tutors have created)and suggested that she consider using what she has and adding to it.
Also suggested that she start with the units that she delivers.
Jing
She is keen to use Jing as a screen casting tool. I suggested that she have a go with it and let me know if she has problems.
iSpringFree
I showed her resources that I had created with iSpringFree and suggested she consider iSpringFree as a useful tool.
Ms Word Forms
I also suggested that she needs to learn to create Word forms.

Reflective Blog
I complimented Jenny on her reflective blog - she has 2 blog posts up already!! Well done, Jenny!
PS: I know Jenny well having worked with her for a number of years and know that she will succeed at this large project. I see the major problem as getting other tutors onboard.

4th Interview
This morning (Friday) found me surrounded by staff at North Ringwood Community House. 4 people attended the interview so we had a great discussion.
They want to engage staff and students with technology. Not sure if they need wiki or Moodle.
Wikispaces
They have a wikispace but are not using it much. They loved the idea of having tutor resources and class resources on wiki. But once again they did not know what sort of a wiki they had.
They want something that is VERY easy to use so I suggested wikispaces.
Multiple Choice Questions
One of them really wants to have self marking multiple choice questions to give her students every week. And had been told that Moodle will do that.
I suggested some other ways of creating multiple choice - Classmarker, Google forms, Ms Word Forms.
Promised to email some samples to her which I have done.

My Thoughts
I am glad that my interviews are done as I am really conscious of our late start with the project.
All of the e-leaders I interviewed were very uncertain of what they were required to do and some thought that I had come to tell them what to do.
When I left they all said that they were much happier so I felt as though I had set their fears to rest.
I did try to make clear to them that it was their project and I was there to make sure that it was an achievable project and that we were all there to support them.
Next step is to make sure that they are all doing their blogs!

Lynne's Week

Just updating on what has been happening this week. I visited Sue at Japara Community House. First time I have been inside the house - driven past it many times but this was my first peek inside the door. Spent some time helping her focus on just one aspect of the many ideas proposed. The first priority appears to be to create a private label wikispaces wiki with the first one being for committee. This was actually proposed by someone on committee and just about all of the committee were keen so Sue felt it was important to "strike while the iron is hot" when they are keen. I agree, and when that is completed, she felt that a class wiki for some of the pre-accredited classes eg music, ICT etc would be the way to go.

We went through the Reality Check and it looks like there is an excellent chance that this will get up and running pretty quickly and will be used consistently. I left her with the task of getting the OK to spend the money on the private label, drawing up a plan of how they want to wiki to look, name of pages, which links to which page, outside links and some documentation that we can upload at our next session. Hopefully, she will pick it up quickly and will be able to them pass her skills onto others in the House eg a tutor or two as well as the committee. I also suggested that she get the committee involved at all stages and would welcome one or two of them at our next session to get them straight into using the wiki and seeing its relevance to them.

I also heard from Sue Trimmer at OELP where I had visited last week and gone through pretty -much the same procedure as they wanted to use wikis as well. She is now ready to go the next step so have made an appointment for next Monday.

Contacted Rowville and they are not ready to do anything until after the Stringybark Festival the weekend after next as they will be playing a huge part in that. Now trying to set up a time for Mulgrave and keep getting fobbed off. However, will try again and see if I can set up an interview time with them.

Have also sent out the Doodle to try to ascertain best times for our online sessions. Not a huge response so far and I will have to close it tomorrow as I want to let people know well ahead of next week's session when it will be. Will send out a warning email after this to remind people to get it done.

Next steps:

1. Get together with eChamps (online perhaps) to work out what we will be doing in each of the online sessions
2. Draw up timetable for online sessions and send out - leave some TBA if not decided on topic yet
3. Create running sheet for next week's online session
4. Contact Mulgrave (again) and set time for interview
5. Visit OELP again and get them started on their wiki

No State Wide PDs

I was very disappointed to hear last Thursday that we are not presenting State Wide PDs. I thought that they were something that we were going to invite the affiliates to.

We are it!
We are supposed to provide the PDs for our e-leaders.
I guess that we need to try to get all of our f2f interviews done next week so we can get together and decide on a program to present at our fortnightly BBCs.

Where I am - actually I am at the beach but still...
I have been working with Jenny at Pines to work out what she needs to learn. She will need to learn or experience pretty much everything - she needs lots of tools for creating online learning resources, advanced wikispaces training,and possibly e-assessment stuff as well as live web conferencing. As I said just about the lot.

I have interviews scheduled for next week:
- Nooraini at BestChance 11am Tuesday
- Janine at Nth Ringwood CH 10am Friday
Will also see Jenny and Pines next week
Haven't had a response from Colleen at The Avenue yet so will ring when I get home and try to arrange an interview for during the week.

Next Steps
Once I get the interviews done I will be know the sort of things they will need to learn

Online Sessions
I think that we need to get together to plan a schedule of training once we know what our e-leaders will need and if we are going to report on it at ConVerge we will have to start at our next online session.

Online Sessions Format?
Perhaps our online sessions could take the format of:
- review of skills from last session - reflective blog for the next one - perhaps someone could do a Poll for who has set up and is using their blog - I would be happy to volunteer Jenny! She has her blog underway.
- introducing new tool or skill according to schedule
- trouble shooting problems encountered

The first online session - catching up!

As I have not contributed much on this blog yet, I thought I would update us on the Blackboard Collaborate (BC) Classroom session (from my perspective) held on Wed last. It was a bit of a disappointing turnup as more said they would be available at that time on the Doodle, however, I think those that did turn up found it quite informative.

I think the intro to BC went pretty well. Maybe I could have let them play a bit more with the tools to help them become more familiar with them. Could also have introduced some games, ice-breakers etc and will do that definitely next session as this will help them to learn some facilitation skills. Next time, we might do a poll and try out the breakout rooms. Because not everyone was there, we will probably have to go through it all again but that's not a bad idea as it will consolidate their learning. As Christine suggested, giving each of them a turn to moderate something small at these sessions will be a great way for them to gain confidence in using it.

The overview of blogging and intro to blogger helped them understand why we wanted them to reflect on their learning journey. Some good questions and answers here I thought. I will back this up by putting some useful blogging links into the wiki. By giving them a look at the ning was my way of encouraging them to join - nobody has yet, however, after the individual sessions perhaps they might take the plunge. I think I advertised it enough - overdid it probably!!

It is great to have two eChamps - Christine and Claire's input was invaluable and even though you did not have much success with your audio Claire, you gave some very pertinent comments in the chat window. I appreciate both your efforts very much. I will send out another Doodle tomorrow to work out a set time for the rest of the fortnightly BC sessions so we can get a timetable up and running. My question is - are the eChamps and eMentors running state-wide training sessions this time and if so, when, who and what? I will put that question into the Moodle. This will impact on what we do in our sessions and our timetable.

For my own orgs - Claire has taken over Orana as Glen Park dropped out and now we have 4 each. I am not sure whether Mulgrave are still going to be participating. I really think they should as they have a big demographic of ESL and they would really benefit from some audio eLearning. I will be seeing them next week and will sort it through then. I have been to see Outer Easter Literacy Program in Boronia. They want to set a a wiki website that has a closed tutors section and students' section. The eLeader Sue has a very clear vision of where she wants it to go and after doing the Reality Check with her and working out a plan of attack, I think it has an excellent chance of getting up and running at least by the end of the year so should have something to report on at Converge. I have an appointment set up for next week with Japarra and Rowville closed for the holidays so will contact them next week as well. All in all, looking good to get some projects under way very soon.

Getting the blogs off the ground

No luck again today in actually getting to speak to my participants - left more messages. I hope they are all back on board next week. In the meantime, I thought focusing on the blog might be a way of helping one of my less confident centres to clarify and focus on their project. Are we setting a deadline for them to get their blog up and running? And are we actively encouraging them to look at each other's blogs to share learning experiences, inspiration, hurdles etc?

monthly online meeting

Well, I finally got there after moodling around the moodle for some time looking for the link, finding a message about the same kind of meeting in August and clicking on the link. When I got there, about half an hour late, I learned from the answer to someone else's question - that the link is sitting there on the front page of the moodle - obviously I can't see the wood for the trees :)

Anyway, it was quite interesting - though the sound from a couple of the microphones being used was so distorted it was hard to decipher what was being said. Most were fine though, and everyone was very welcoming. My main preoccupation was following all the typed entries fast enough to try and catch up on the discussion that had gone on before, before the box zoomed down to something else just typed in.

So what do I remember? I'm not sure that anything definite was decided about the showcase - seems to be a case of more lengthy discussion on the moodle - but one idea was that the project participants finding innovative ways of using technology for learning, might like to 'showcase' their findings.

Somebody - can't remember who - in the discussion on the reporting requirements agreed to put up some key points on Moodle spelling out the kind of things that needed to be reflected in the blogs - which would be useful, I think.

I now know that Converge 11 is a conference - but what on, and where, was lost in the microphone muffle - but no doubt you'll be able to enlighten me :) And the next meetings will be on a Monday - the dates will go on the Moodle calendar.

Finally made it :)

Hi Christine and Lynne
The link worked accessing it from the invite in my google email address, so that's good, and one new thing I have learned about inviting people to blogger blogs.

I thought the session went well today - it can be quite daunting I think for people when it is their first session - trying to take everything in and have a go at practising at the same time. You both did a good job - sorry my audio was so temperamental. Next time I'll do it from work - my pc there is much better behaved!

Claire

f2f Limitations & Successes

I have been reviewing my paperwork after the f2f session on Wednesday.
Results not as good as I hoped - though I have had good feedback from one participant - she enjoyed the session and felt she gained confidence by attending - Great result!!
We had intended to take photos on the day but I forgot to take my camera and then we were busily engaged all through the session. Must at least remember to take camera next time.

My 4 RTOs
1 RTO did not attend or send an apology
1 RTO attended but not the e-leader
2 RTOs attended but I may have to interview again for information for project

So...
I suspect that I may still have to complete 3 f2f interviews early in the new term

Success (I hope)
I have already planned a blackboard session with one e-leader on Monday - just to clarify project and suggest first steps
It will be good to get one underway!!

f2f Meeting

Today we had our first f2f meeting.
We had only 11 e-leaders attending we scrapped our session plan which had catered for up to 30 participants and individually interviewed e-leaders.

The Plan
We had planned to really push the networking at this meeting by seating the participants at small round tables and getting them to discuss questions reporting back to the large group.

What actually happened
We asked particpants to fill out the e-leader form we had created to detail their existing skills as they arrived.
Lynne explained the project then we individually interviewed. We still sat our participants at the small tables and each of us went to one table to interview the participants at that table.
We broke for afternoon tea then came back for Lynne to explain the next steps and demonstrate Elluminate and the eastern ementor wiki.

How did it go
I felt that it went well. I interviewed 4 e-leaders.
-one knew what she wanted to achieve.
-one was a manager and didn't know what the actual e-leader wanted to achieve
-two had no idea what they wanted - I spent some time talking to them and we devised achievable projects for them.

Afterwards
Lynne, Claire & I sorted out the completed forms and decided which RTOs each of us would look after.
This is the format - I have created this with Bubbl.us - great way to create these! Thanks, Liz!

Follow up
We still have to interview the RTOs who did not attend the session.
We have planned our first Elluminate session for Wednesday 5 October - this is in the school holidays so not sure what our turn out will be. Lynne will create a Doodle to offer different times on Wednesday afternoon for this session. We did feel that we have to get moving as we have started late.