Week 2 Toughts

Hi everybody!

This week was great for me. First of all I  learned a lot about writing objective by  studying the "ABCD learning objectives framework". Summing up it is as follows:

The A.B.C.D. methodThe ABCD method of writing objectives is an excellent starting point for writing objectives (Heinich, et al., 1996). In this system, "A" is for audience, "B" is for behavior, "C" for conditions and "D" for degree of mastery needed.

1. Audience (A) – Who? Who are your learners?

1. Behavior (B) – What? What do you expect them to be able to do? This should be an overt, observable behavior, even if the actual behavior is covert or mental in nature. If you can't see it, hear it, touch it, taste it, or smell it, you can't be sure your audience really learned it.

1. Condition (C) – How? Under what circumstances or context will the learning occur? What will the student be given or already be expected to know to accomplish the learning?

1. Degree (D) – How much? How much will be accomplished, how well will the behavior need to be performed, and to what level? Do you want total mastery (100%), do you want them to respond correctly 80% of the time, etc. A common (and totally non-scientific) setting is 80% of the time.

Source: http://ets.tlt.psu.edu/learningdesign/objectives/writingobjectives/

 Following this framework for sure will help students to learn more because, they can see better what they are expected to accomplish and how. Besides, the conditions students have to accomplish  the learning are strongly related to how much they accomplish. If they do not understand this, how can they have the adequate  behavior and so, learn? Learning has a lot to do with how the teacher sets the objectives of the activity with the students. The better it is done, the more students learn. For sure I will change the way I give instructions and set objectives in class.


The second thing I was surprised and grateful to learn about is related to effective searching. How naive I was! I used to think that Google was the best search engine of all! Well, although it is the most famous, it is not the best in all situations. There are a lot of search engines and using them well depends on our needs. For example, if you need a dictionary, search:

Yahoo Reference Definitions, etymology, synonyms (English and Spanish) and audio-pronunciation Merriam-Webster Dictionary and Thesaurus Definitions, etymology, synonyms and audio-pronunciation WordCentral Definitions with pictures (student dictionary) Adapted from: http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/info rmation/5locate/adviceengine.html

Well, in all this process my course colleagues and my orientator, Donna, were very friendly and supportive. Hope we keep learning a lot together!

See you next week!

Ju

Brazil