Sarah Stewart

Normal Labour and Birth: 5th Research Conference

2009-11-22T19:58:00.004+13:00

The 5th Normal Labour and Birth Research Conference is coming up next July in Vancouver.

This session will specifically focus on concepts and controversies around the experiences of physiologic birth by providers, women, families, and systems of care within the current social, political, and economic context.

The conference will provide the opportunity to develop and disseminate evidence related to the benefits and challenges of preserving normal labour and birth with a particular focus on the multidisciplinary perspectives on the implications for clinical practice, perinatal outcomes, education, management, collaboration, and policy.

I am thinking I will submit an abstract, talking about how we're using the Second Life normal birth scenario to teach midwifery students about birth environment and how to work with women in primary birth units.

Image: Vancouver at night janusz l
http://www.flickr.com/photos/januszbc/3841429899/

A challenge for my facilitation skills

2009-11-22T07:42:00.006+13:00

I am off to Cairns for the few days next week to facilitate a symposium about eMentoring on behalf of Aged Care Queensland. This is an extension of the eMentoring project I was involved with earlier in the year. The aim of the symposium is to explore the issues around eMentoring related to indigenous aged care and community staff - to find out what the barriers and enablers are, and how eMentoring can be progressed in a way that benefits staff.

Working with indigenous people
The symposium will be made up of Australian indigenous and Torres Strait people. This is the first time I have worked with Australian indigenous and Torres Strait people so I have been concerned that we develop a program that will be relevant, and in particular my facilitation is done in an appropriate and respectful way.

I will be co-facilitating with Steve Begg, who has done a lot of work in aged care in Australia and is an indigenous person himself. It has been very interesting talking to him and comparing approaches in Australia to how a Maori hui in New Zealand would be facilitated.

Facilitating a conversation
I'm still not sure that we have things right. I'm not sure I'm the right person to facilitate the session - I think it should be an indigenous person. But having said that, I am the one with the in-depth knowledge of eMentoring so that is the justification for having me as facilitator. I am still a little fearful that we're coming into the symposium with our own agenda which may inhibit responses. Time will tell.

The key things for me are to:

acknowledge the people of the place - and bring greetings and acknowledgment from my own land
give people time and space to get to know each other and get to know me
keep the symposium as a flexible conversation as opposed to regimented formal program
make sure we achieve ACQI outcomes ie answer the questions we have to ask
give people opportunities to answer the questions in different formats - verbal and written...paper and online
give people the opportunity to give feedback in a supported way that does not shame them.

How to facilitate in-depth discussion
I feel that my main role is to encourage conversation and discussion in a way that feels safe to the participants. When it comes to asking about their personal skills and experiences I aim to use anonymous methods so that people can disclose without feeling shamed. I'm going to use small groups to discuss questions about cultural issues pertaining to eMentoring. And broad issues such as organizational barriers, which hopefully do not feel personally threatening, will be discussed as a large group.

Do you have any advice or tips on how to facilitate discussion that generates lots of information but keeps people feeling safe?

Image: Great Barrier Reef, Cairns, Australia The Lightworks
http://www.flickr.com/photos/leonardlow/340824760/

Joining a "Learn4Content" workshop

2009-11-21T06:49:00.004+13:00

I have just joined a free two week workshop called Learn4Content facilitated by Wikieducator - it starts on Monday 23rd November if you're interested in joining.

What is Wikieducator?
Wikieducator is a non-profit wiki that is used by teachers to develop teaching and learning resources that are open and free for use by everyone. It works in the same way as Wikipedia. I have always complained that Wikieducator is difficult to use for newbies, especially compared to wiki such as Wikispaces. However, I am feeling a lot more confident since I started using Wikieducator for the Second Life Education New Zealand project:

http://wikieducator.org/The_virtual_birthing_unit_project

What I want to achieve
I feel comfortable with very basic wiki skills so my aim for the course is to grow my skills so I can do more complex things in the wiki such as add media, construct brochures, and develop my personal page. Ultimately, I want to feel confident enough to edit Wikipedia.

Online facilitation
The other thing I am interested in is seeing how other people facilitate online. Willie Campbell did this workshop last time and recommended I did the workshop because it is such a wonderful example of online facilitation. In view of the fact that I teach online facilitation and can always improve my own skills, I thought it would be a good opportunity to experience differing facilitation styles and methods.

...and it is free...so that's all good.

Sarah Stewart, facilitator and consultant

2009-11-20T22:43:00.005+13:00

After nearly a year of swanning around and having my mid life crises, I have come to the stage I have to decide what I want to do when I grow up.

What I'm planning for 2010
I have been offered a job working 0.5 at the Otago Polytechnic Educational Development Center as an educational programmer/facilitator. But that leaves me to find other work and projects. After consideration, I've decided that my best option is to become a self-employed facilitator and consultant in education, eLearning and workplace learning, focusing on heath professionals in New Zealand and Australia.

The way forward
I am looking forward to being flexible and picking up projects that I find suits my interests. But I have a lot of things to do before I am able to get my new business off the ground including deciding on a slogan, designing a logo, setting up websites and domains and marketing my services.

Do you have any advice for me to help me set up my business?

Image: Astra křovinatá - Bee is busy [Aster dumosus] fesoj
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fesoj/3960397486/in/set-72157622551870714/

Off to my first ever "unconference"

2009-11-20T16:51:00.005+13:00

I am off to my first ever 'unconference' on Monday at Otago University - Internet Research Group of Otago. I am chairing a panel entitled "Becoming more collaborative"

I would like to think about how we can become more collaborative and open - between professions, educational and professional institutions and work places so that we reduce all the 'wheel reinvention' that goes on, and work together across settings & contexts.

Panel
Along with me is Dr Wayne Macintosh, founder of Wikieducator, who is going to talk about 'open research'. I am going to describe how the SLENZ project worked in an open, collaborative environment, and Cameron Campbell is going to play devil's advocate and explain why open, collaborative research is a pipe dream in today's competitive research market.

Organisaton
I have never been to an unconference before so it will be interesting to see how everything pans out. The organizers have left the topic choice and panel selection up to the participants. The result should be that the conference more fully suits the needs of the participants compared formally arranged conferences.

Online unconference for health professionals?
I was thinking how I could organise an online unconference for health professionals - is it something you'd be interested in? What topics would you like to see addressed, by whom and by what online tools?

Image: blue rose macro atomicshark
http://www.flickr.com/photos/atomicshark/125773243/

Would you donate your body for medical students to cut up?

2009-11-19T21:31:00.003+13:00

I watched a fascinating and touching TV program last night about the people who have donated their bodies to the Dunedin School of Medicine for student doctors to dissect.

You would think, being a health professional, that I would have thought about how student doctors learn about anatomy and physiology, but I haven't. As a student nurse and midwife, I never did anything more exciting than inject an orange. So I sort of assumed that doctors learned about anatomy and physiology out of a book, the same way I did. I was once offered the chance to go to an autopsy as a student nurse but declined the offer.

The program was very sensitively filmed, I thought, and at the end I was in tears with the students as they watched the interviews of the people who they had cut up, and heard the reasons why they had donated their bodies.

I don't know if I would want to donate my body to science. On the one hand, I feel very squeamish about the idea. But on the other hand, a dead body has no soul...and if it benefited the learning of young doctors, then all to the good.

Would you donate your body to science?

What do you do in your sleep?

2009-11-19T21:23:00.002+13:00

I have been horrified but morbidly fascinated to read the story about the man in the UK who killed his wife in his sleep. Apparently, he was dreaming he was fighting an intruder but was actually strangling his wife. He is pleading innocence by way of insanity.

I have been in danger of being murdered in my sleep by my darling hubby who regularly gets very fed up with my snoring...

What terrible or funny things have you done in your sleep?

Sick of spam

2009-11-19T07:52:00.004+13:00

I am afraid I am going to have to do something I swore I would never do...and turn on 'word verification'. This means you will have to verify a word before you can post a comment. I didn't want to use this feature because I believe it reduces the spontaneity of commenting, but I have started getting so much spam that I have no choice.

Do you have any other suggestions about how I can solve the spam problem without having to resort to word verification?

Learning a few painful lesson about presenting in Second Life

2009-11-17T16:57:00.011+13:00

I had the life scared out of me last Friday morning in Second Life and as a result have learned a few painful lessons about presenting in Second Life.

Virtual birthing unit becoming famous
A few weeks ago I was approached by the Gronstedt 'Train for Success Group, one of the biggest education and research groups in Second Life...except at the time I didn't know that. They asked if I could give a presentation about the virtual birthing unit and show them around. I said 'yes' and didn't think much more about it. I am so used to planning virtual events and no-one turning up that I didn't put any thought into how I was going to manage the presentation and tour.

Do what I say and not what I do
The irony is that I am currently teaching students how to facilitate online and yet I didn't take my own advice. I under estimated the number of people that would attend and the effect it would have on the technology of Second Life, and I didn't consider the practicalities of showing 40-50 people around the birth unit by myself. Luckily for me, I managed to secure the services of John Waugh who is one of the SLENZ team to help me out.

Sharing knowledge – The Gronstedt Group begins tour of the SLENZ birthing unit

How things turned out
In the end things didn't turn out to badly, although they could have been a lot better if I'd been more organized. I am not sure how many people turned up but it must have been over 35 people. The technology held up well, but I have to acknowledge that it is a challenge showing more than 10 people around because of time lag and keeping people together.

What did I learn about presenting in Second Life?
Giving a presentation in SL is no different from any where else...you have to be well prepared. The main lesson for me is that I need a lot more helpers in SL than I would need in another web conferencing environment. This means I have to be a lot more organized...give my helpers plenty of notice and make sure at least one of my helpers is very skilled at sorting out problems in SL.

It's also a good idea to have a notecard to hand to people, like a business card, with the contact details of everyone involved in the birthing unit project.

Feedback about the birth unit
We had great feedback about the birthing unit. One of the group said it was one of the best educational resources that he had ever seen. And we had lots of comments about the toilet being the first one that people had come across in Second Life! :)

What tips would you give people about presenting online, especially in Second Life?

PS: Keep an eye on the Gronstedt website because a recording of the presentation and tour will be available in a few days.

Do you have a public Google profile?

2009-11-14T20:03:00.003+13:00

I have just discovered a new element of the Google range and that is the public Google profile - here is mine: http://www.google.com/profiles/sarahstewart07

Having a public Google Profile will increase your presence on the Internet which is particularly important if you want to promote yourself online for whatever reason. The instructions on how to do it can be found here.

What I like about it is that it very easily hooks in your other online channels like YouTube, Slideshare and blog accounts. Let me know how to find your profile - I'd love to have a look to see how you use it.

Which is more effective - a team or community of practice?

2009-11-10T17:05:00.005+13:00

I am writing an abstract for the conference "Breathing new life into maternity care". This conference is a multi-disciplinary conference held in 2010 in Alice Springs, Australia.

Team or community of practice?
One of the main aims of the conference is to bring midwives and obstetricians together to encourage more collaborative teamwork amongst the two professions. I was all set to write an abstract talking about how we can use online communication tools to work more effectively as a virtual team. But I have got side tracked into asking the question: should we be aiming to form virtual teams in maternity services or would it be more appropriate to think in terms of communities of practice? What is the difference? What will work better?

Working in teams
I have to be honest and admit to some suspicion when I hear the call for 'teamwork'. I welcome inter-professional collaboration but my idea of teamwork sometimes differs from that of other health professionals. I'm all for teamwork but in a team where I am an equal partner, bringing my own strengths and perspectives that are valued along with every other member of the team.

Developing communities of practice
So maybe we should be focusing on developing communities of practice as opposed to teams. I see communities of practice being less hierarchical than teams and more inclusive...where members work together to support, mentor and develop each other....and where consumers (and their families) can join and contribute.

What do you think - is there a difference between teams and communities of practice, or is it just a matter of semantics?

Image: '3D Full Spectrum Unity Holding Hands Concept'
www.flickr.com/photos/22177648@N06/2137735924 lumaxart

Embedding the Second Life virtual birthing unit into midwifery education

2009-11-10T08:08:00.004+13:00

I have been invited to the schools of midwifery at Hamilton and Wellington later in December to demonstrate the virtual birthing unit and brain storm ideas about how it can be embedded into midwifery education.

Plan for the sessions
I thought I'd break up the days into several sessions. The first session I will talk about the Second Life Education New Zealand (SLENZ) project and how the virtual birthing unit came about. I'll also describe exactly what the birth unit and normal birth scenario do and achieve. Then, I'll run a Second Life workshop and orientate the midwives to SL. At the same time I'll talk about some of the barriers to SL and how we can overcome them. In the last part of the day I'll ask the midwifery lecturers to brain storm how they could use the birth unit in their program next year.

Where does the birth unit sit in a three year midwifery program?
I haven't seen the SLENZ student evaluation so I feel a little as if I am groping in the dark. But my sense is there are three options for the birth unit:

orientation to the clinical context for first year students
activity for second year students as they learn about normal birth
revision activity for third year students.

In view of what I have heard from students, I wonder if the scenario is sophisticated enough for the senior students - I get the sense that it is more appropriate for junior students. We need to do more development, giving a wider range of options and variables before it will capture the attention of senior students. In the meantime, it is an ideal orientation tool for junior students - it makes them think and really stretches them, yet at the same time they feel safe because they are unable to 'harm' anyone and feel protected from the less forgiving real-life clinical situation.

Other options in Second Life for midwifery education
I was thinking that it would be worth talking about other resources in SL that midwifery educators could utilise in their program. The first thing that obviously comes to mind is the post-partum haemorrhage scenario that has been developed by the University of Auckland. There is also the heart murmur simulation and Genome Island.

The Virtual Hallucination may also be of value. I would love to see it adapted to fit the context of post-partum psychosis but it is still relevant to midwifery students who will come across women (and their families) who have mental health issues.

Working with midwifery educators outside New Zealand
I'd love to hear from any educators outside New Zealand (or outside midwifery) who are interested in using the birth unit and normal birth scenario in their own programs. I am very interested in setting up an international collaborative evaluation/study so please let me know if you'd like more information.

In my next blog post I'd like to talk more about how the birth unit and its impact on midwifery education can be evaluated.

Image: Visiting Genome Island

Free mini-conference starts today

2009-11-09T09:48:00.003+13:00

The course 'Facilitating Online' has a mini-conference that starts today - details can be found here. There are a range of free synchronous and asynchronous events that you can attend - if you want to know more about a particular event, please contact the individual facilitator.

This mini-conference is the highlight of the course I have been facilitating over the last few months - I feel like a new mum about to give birth :) I'm a little nervous but also very excited.

So please feel free to attend and support the students - I'm sure you'll find heaps to interest you, especially if you want to know more about social networking and eLearning:

All you need to know about Twitter
Going online to save the mala - early lessons from a web-based conservation planning process
Use of wiki in education
Implementing online tools into your teaching
Google Reader and Delicious
Moodle, Ning, Wikieducator,Facebook and WiZiQ
Too many cooks spoil the broth, so they say....So what of Too many Tools?

Image: 'yellow umbrella' // solidether
www.flickr.com/photos/7185311@N03/1084349065

Second Life and science teachers

2009-11-08T16:27:00.003+13:00

I have been asked by one of the science lecturers at Otago Polytechnic to show her Second Life. She is involved with teaching foundation science to students who want to go on to programs like nursing and midwifery.

I want to show her some sites that would interest her and that she can use with her students. The one place I know of is Genome Island, which is a place where you can explore resources and activities that focus on genetics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LUidRI_MnM&feature=player_embedded

Do you know of any other places that would interest a science teacher, especially with a health focus?

A disturbing experience in Second Life

2009-11-07T08:09:00.004+13:00

I had a very intense, disturbing experience in Second Life last night.

I went to see the Virtual Hallucination simulation that has been developed by UC Davis. It has been designed to give us a better understanding of what it feels like to have schizophrenia. Based on the stories of two people who have schizophrenia, it aims to provide an auditory and visual experience that simulates how schizophrenics see and hear the world.

To my mind this is the most powerful teaching/learning experiences in Second Life - it moved and disturbed me. If you have any interest in mental health, especially if you are a health professional working in the area I would recommend you visit this place. But be warned that it is an intense experience.

If you cannot access Second Life, have a look at this video which will give you a feel for the place.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s33Y5nI5Wbc

Vuvox: a great alternative to PowerPoint

2009-11-05T00:23:00.004+13:00

I have just been introduced to a nice alternative presentation tool to PowerPoint by @carlosrizo: vuvox collage. It's very easy to use and looks really nice. The only thing I need to work out is if I can download the collage so I can use it if I haven't got access to the Internet.

Here's a collage I have made about Flickr and Creative Commons.

http://www.vuvox.com/collage/detail/0196513e3b

Meeting people who actually read my blog

2009-11-01T09:02:00.004+13:00

It was very exciting on Friday to meet people who actually read my blog. I don't have a large readership and use this blog primarily to process my own thinking and learning. But it's lovely hear that people find my writing interesting (although goodness knows why!?) and get some useful information out of it.

So a big 'hello' to Susie Lepage, Yvonne Rika and Jean Jacoby who are nurses and educators interested in exploring Second Life for nurse education. Thank you for reading my blog. I hope you'll find what I have written to be of help as you plan your Second Life project, especially my experiences of working on the virtual birthing unit.

To anyone who reads this blog: please don't be afraid to leave a comment to say 'hello'. It feels very lonely here at times and is always nice to hear from people, even if it's just a quick word or two :)

Nurses and Second Life

2009-11-01T00:24:00.004+13:00

I was invited to a meeting of nurse educators in Wellington on Friday. They were from a number of New Zealand educational institutions and were very interested in the potential of Second Life for nurse education. Needless to say, they were especially interested in hearing about the Second Life Education New Zealand project and in particular the virtual birthing unit.

Nursing and medical resources in Second Life
There are few avenues these days for educational funding in New Zealand so these nurses are going to have to think about how they can utilize resources that are already available in Second Life. So the first step in their collaborative project is to review how nurses and health professionals are using SL.

Projects in JoKaydia
Health education in Second Life
Top 10: Virtual Medical Sites in Second Life!
SLENZ virtual birthing unit
Land of the Long White Cloud - virtual hospital
SL Health - email discussion list for health educators using SL

My advice
My advice to nurse educators looking at Second Life is to:

find a SL mentor and learn as much as you can about how SL works;
network with other nurse and health professionals using SL using online communication tools such as blogs, YouTube, Slideshare and of course, Second Life;
develop learning activities in SL that require little or no development to keep things as cheap and easy as possible;
work alongside your educational institution to ensure you have full access to SL;
collaborate with each other using virtual tools such as wiki, Google Docs, Skype and SL.

I would love to hear from you if you are involved in nurse education and Second Life - what do you teach in SL? How effective have you found it? What would you advise nurse educators starting out in SL?

Facilitating a forum for indigenous aged care workers, November 2009

2009-10-31T23:36:00.003+13:00

I feel very honored to have been asked to help facilitate a forum for aboriginal and Torres Strait aged care staff in Cairns, later in November. This forum is the last element of the eMentoring project I developed for Aged Care Queensland.

What mentoring support aged care staff require
Whilst the eMentoring project was aimed at indigenous aged care staff, very few people volunteered to take part. It goes without saying that we should have consulted more thoroughly with indigenous workers before we even started the project, so we're doing things back to front. Nevertheless, what we would like to know is:

what mentoring support do indigenous aged care staff want and need?
how can Aged Care Queensland facilitate mentoring support, if it is required?
how would staff prefer to receive mentoring support - face-to-face, electronic or a mix?
what are the barriers to eMentoring?
how can Aged Care Queensland break down the barriers to eMentoring?

Plan for the forum
We are developing an agenda for the forum with indigenous advisers. Our plan is for an informal discussion, focus group approach to seeking information. The other part of the forum is to run a computer skills workshop.

Seeking ideas and advice
I have not worked with aboriginal and Torres Strait people before. The last thing I want to do is offend anyone or go about things in an inappropriate way. In particular, I hope to make the computer workshop as user-friendly as possible. So I would especially appreciate any ideas or advice about how to approach the computer skills workshop.

Image: 'Great Barrier Reef, Cairns, Australia' The Lightworks
www.flickr.com/photos/22385963@N00/340751615

The future of Second Life and education

2009-10-31T07:46:00.004+13:00

I have been thinking about where I stand in relation to Second Life now the virtual birthing unit project has more or less come to an end. If I want to continue to develop the birthing unit and become involved in more SL projects, I need to develop my SL skills. At the same time, I am not sure if the future in education for SL merits the time it will take me to upgrade my skills. And the contradictory opinion about SL of education experts doesn't help me in my decision-making.

The problems with Second Life
Clearly there are barriers to the use of Second Life in education, especially in New Zealand. Lack of Internet access, inadequate computer technology, institutional firewalls and policies can make it difficult for students and teachers to engage with SL. And the time it takes to learn SL skills can be prohibitive. Stephen Blythe is one of my students in the online course Facilitating Online - his story is a typical one.

Dr Alan Cann, a lecturer at the University of Leicester feels very strongly that SL is expensive, cumbersome, poorly designed and time-consuming. He says:

There is, above all else, one thing that Second Life is unsurpassed for. If you need to generate a large amount of cash from a naive grant-awarding body over-eager to jump on the Web 2.0 bandwagon, offer to build, for a preposterous amount of cash, a virtual representation of something that already exists in the real world but that no-one will ever use in SL. Something like, say, Belgium. You'll be quids in. Careers have been built on it.

Second Life and Gen Y
I was talking to Dr Erika Pearson this week about how young people use the Internet. Erika is a media studies lecturer at the University of Otago. She believes Second Life will not become main stream with Gen Y students because they are only interested in communication tools that are cheap, quick and easy to use like Facebook and cell phone text.

The future of education lies in virtual reality
Nevertheless, there are educators who believe the opposite - that students do better learning skills in Second Life than those who do not use SL. John Waugh, of the Second Life Education New Zealand project says it is vital that educators become familiar with Second Life and other virtual worlds and realities - educators who ignore virtual reality do so at their peril and will be left behind in the very near future. Whilst SL may not be the preferred virtual world of the future, skills learned in SL will be transferable.

My love-hate relationship with Second Life
If the interest and enthusiasm by New Zealand educators is anything to go by, I cannot ignore Second Life. So whilst I continue to have a love-hate relationship with SL, it's clear I need to develop my skills so that I can continue research on the virtual birthing unit and evaluate learning outcomes, and become a resource for educators wishing to explore virtual worlds.

Image: jokaydiaunconf-SLENZ_001 kerryj.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kerryank/3957681375

Can someone lend me their garden please?

2009-10-26T13:35:00.003+13:00

Every spring my hubby and I have the same argument about the garden. I want to have a go at growing vegetables but the truth of the matter is we just don't have enough room. I grow a few tomatoes, but I'd really like to have a decent allotment or something like that.

I understand there are a couple of community gardens in Dunedin, but I'm not too sure what they entail, and I'm too selfish to want to grow a lot of veggies that then get pinched by the 'community'. I also know that Horty Kim is running a permaculture garden at Otago Polytechnic, so I need to go and have a look there.

But what I would really like is for someone to 'lend' me a patch of their garden that I can turn into a veggie patch. If you have a garden that you're not using and would be happy to let me potter around in it, please let me know as soon as possible.

Sad news for Dunedin

2009-10-26T10:48:00.002+13:00

Just as I got back to Dunedin I was very sad to hear that Otago Polytechnic is closing one of the community learning centers and loosing a number of staff from them. These learning centres have been a fabulous resource for the Dunedin community, offering free computer courses that range from how to use Trademe to national computing certificates. My understanding is that these centers have always been well utilised by the local community over the years.

I must admit I don't know all the ins and outs but I believe that government funding for free courses has been cut, so Otago Polytechnic cannot afford to fund the learning centers from it's own budget.

What a shame we are using such a valuable community service in Dunedin. But never mind.....we've got the new stadium to look forward to.

Having a moan about Dunedin's bus service

2009-10-26T10:33:00.002+13:00

Those of you who follow my blog know I have just got back from working in Australia for nine months and now have a two month contract as education programmer and facilitator at Otago Polytechnic, which is eight minutes car drive from my house.

In an effect to reduce my carbon footprint, I've decided to use the bus to get to and from work. I am very lucky...there is a bus stop right outside my house. So I can get from door step to door step, although I do have to swap buses in the center of town, and it takes 30 - 40 minutes, depending on connections. But the time isn't so much of an issue because I like to read the newspaper on the bus and watch the world go by.

What has shocked me is the price of the bus fare. A return journey is $9 ... and that includes a discount! So even allowing $5 for parking, it is cheaper to drive to work. Apparently, what stuffs me up is the fact I have to catch two buses so I get charged two bus fares, instead of being charged one amount for the whole journey.

Not a great incentive to stop driving my car! And goodness knows how people on social benefit etc can afford $45 per week it's going to cost me on bus fares.

PS: In Brisbane, my bus journey to work cost me $6 return (which was about an hour long and took two buses) and in Darwin cost $4 return (40 minutes long).

Loving Dunedin

2009-10-25T09:08:00.010+13:00

We have had old friends from England visit us this weekend, so we have been out and about the Dunedin area playing tourist.

I have been away from Dunedin for nearly a year and seduced by the wonderful places I have been to, especially Darwin. So it has been great to get home and reconnect to Dunedin, reminding myself of why we love it here. And what has helped has been that we've had the most beautiful weather this weekend.

We had a fabulous walk on Allen's Beach and saw a number of New Zealand Hooker sea lions, watched albatross soar over the cliffs of Taiaroa Head and chased Hector's dolphins on The Monarch.

The icing on the cake was a fabulous evening at Carisbrook where we saw Otago win the last match of the Air New Zealand Cup. Hypothermia is an occupational hazard when you go to watch rugby at Carisbrook, so it was a delight to be able to sit on The Terraces stripped down to tee-shorts.

As I always say.....there's no place on earth like Dunedin on a beautiful day........the trouble is, we only have about five days like it in a year!

Completing my Graduate Certificate in Tertiary Learning and Teaching

2009-10-16T19:42:00.009+13:00

This is the last piece of work I have to submit for my Graduate Certificate in Tertiary Learning and Teaching delivered by Otago Polytechnic. This assessment is part of the requirements for the course Learner Centered Learning and is a reflection on a teaching session I carried out a couple of days ago.

Critical review of teaching practice
The teaching session I carried out was an introduction to Second Life as part of the Facilitating Online course I am currently facilitating. The session was held on Thursday 14th at 8pm. Five students attended. The session was planned for one hour but we were together for an hour and 40 minutes.

We started off in Elluminate where I outlined the aim of the session; provided reference materials that the students could use after the session; outlined a back-up plan if the SL technology didn't work; briefly described what Second Life was and how it could be used to develop an online community. I also provided a link to an online survey that allowed students to give me feedback about the session.

What happened when we got to Second Life
Three students managed to find their way to Second Life and meet me. One student took about 30 minutes to reach us and I lost the last student completely (I did eventually catch up with the student and offered to do some one-to-one work with her at a later stage). I attempted to show students how to use IM and voice, move backwards and forward, sit down, add friends, teleport, make landmarks and find them in the inventory. We got through these things but it took a lot of time because of various technical problems. In the end, we only had time to visit Koru and the SLENZ - we didn't make it to JoKaydia. This was disappointing because it is there that I think students would have got a sense of community in SL. The other element of the lesson plan we did not achieve was learning how to change one's appearance but that isn't as important as learning to communicate.

My facilitation approach
I believe the best way for students to learn skills in Second Life is to be with them, to guide and demonstrate, be on hand to answer questions but also give them time to practice by themselves (Learning for Life, 2005). I attempted to do that but as we ran out of time I rushed the students through the last couple of activities. However, the students do have a resource that described all the skills we went through so they can go back into SL and practice as and when they like. I have also made it quite clear I am happy to meet students again in SL if they need further help.

Students and technology
Working in complex technical environments such as SL is a challenge, to say the least (Carr, Oliver & Burn, 2008). The main considerations for teachers is the level of students' technical abilities and their access to the technology.

I was mindful that there was different level of technical ability amongst the students so had to cater for students at the lowest level. But I was also concerned about how to deal with the students who were very capable and likely to get bored as I focused on students who needed help. I didn't really have an answer to that one.

Usually when I am working with a group of people in SL I prefer to have someone helping me...someone who can deal with individual issues as I work with the whole class. The two people I had lined up to do that were unable to attend so I was stuck trying to meet everyone's needs. I don't feel that went as well because I tried to achieve too much. At the same time, I think I am being hard on myself...we achieved quite a lot considering at least one student had technical issues. And it is difficult to separate out SL skills because one skill often depends on several others so you have to teach them all together.

What I did well:

prepared for the session doing things like making sure I had added everyone into my contact list beforehand;
developed a supporting resource that students can continue to work with;
presented the session with humor and patience, and was approachable.

What I would do differently next time:

reduce the content of the session - reduce the time I spent with my introduction in Elluminate - or make it into a two hour session;
arrange to meet other people in SL so students would see the social/community aspect of SL as opposed to just focusing on skills.

Observer’s feedback
Here is the feedback I received from the evaluation survey. And here is the feedback I received by email.
- learning by doing is important: so you showed how to cope when things went bit haywire ... taking a light hearted approach is good
- really SL is much about escapism as serious stuff - finding out about communication in SL was really important, including adding friends, etc... very important foundation to make sense of space, and we covered this well - the introduction was in Elluminate was a tad too long
- I'm not sure if everyone would have finished with a sense of accomplishment (Mertle seemed to be struggling with movement)
- I reckon it would be useful to have a checklist of what we were going to cover - including why this is important (ie building blocks) - then at the end show what we've actually covered. This could also form a checklist of what to cover next if the list was not completed in an initial meeting, or practice.
- it would have been useful to address ways you can 'protect' yourself if you're intimidated by any strangers (without this I'm not sure if others would feel okay about going back independently or perhaps it's a non issue)
- as a teacher or facilitator in this environment, a lot of it is obviously about familiarising people with how to do things. You covered this well, but I don't a sense of what online community actually looks like... probably a second session.

Response to feedback
The feedback has reflected my feelings about this session - too much attempted in too short a time, and not enough focus on the social/community aspects of SL.

The checklist was developed in the resource I told students about at the beginning of the session. I needed to remind the students about it at the end of the session and conclude the session more effectively. But because we ran so late, we all disappeared off without a proper conclusion and summary of what we had achieved.
Teaching students how to deal with unpleasant behavior in SL is a very important. Next time I can make sure that information is included in the resource I give students, especially if I do not have time to talk to them about it.

Conclusion
I am left with a feeling that we need another session in SL to bring all the skills together in a learning activity or experience in which students can make sense of what they learned on Thursday (Gagnon & Collay, no date). Responding to student needs is a vital part of providing learner centered learning. A flexible approach to content delivery including online technologies allows me to offer another session in SL in the next couple of weeks to consolidate what students learned and deal with ongoing issues.

References
Australian Flexible Learning Framework. (2008). Designing elearning. Retrieved 17 October, 2009, from http://designing.flexiblelearning.net.au

Carr, D., Oliver, M., & Burn, A. (2008). Learning to teach in Second Life. http://learningfromsocialworlds.wordpress.com/learning-to-teach-in-second-life

Gagnon, G., & Collay, M. (no date). Constructivist Learning Design. Retrieved 17 October, 2009, from http://www.prainbow.com/cld/cldp.html

Learning for Life. (2005). How to teach a skill. Retrieved 17 October, 2009, from http://www.learningforlife.org/exploring/resources/99-720/y13.pdf