My PKM

PKM	Critical Thinking Process	Tools and Strategies
SEEK	Observe, search, reading and study	Google + and Google Scholar. In previous courses I have used both of these tools to find academic papers and interesting articles to use in essay writing and discussion boards. Course notes –As with all my other subjects I am finding David’s course notes very useful. They introduce me to new ways of thinking and link me to resources that I can use both in the course and my future learning. Other participants blogs, diigo and feedly (not used as much as the previous two mentioned) – which are all new to me but I think I am getting the hang of reading and getting the important pieces of information from them that will be useful to me.
SENSE	Challenge & Evaluation, Form tentative opinions, gain understanding.	I am a big note taker that brainstorms ideas and new concepts. I like to use presentations and collaborate with colleagues to gain understanding and insights that I may not have thought of. I read related topics and try to link their ideas to my train of though and understanding.
SHARE	Participate and reading	Blog posts, Diigo, course discussion boards, Facebook, feedly, presentations (PowerPoint) and twitter (which I have just joined – something I never thought I would do)

Applying the test Framework

I am somewhat familiar with what the above tools can do but I find that the more I use them the more I learn which in turn shows me that I can learn by doing (one of my fears) a learning style promoted by NGL.

I am a hard worker and in recent years I have developed the skills of reading and writing academic styled notes and papers. I believe that I do have the skills to complete the identified tasks in this course.

I am computer literate and can combine my learning and knowledge to discuss a certain topic. I know that I will have difficulty at first in finding my way around the technology required to complete this course (I have only read from feedly so far and still have to learn how to post and link) but hope to overcome this by participating in the activities provided on the course notes and information provided by the course members and lecttures.

Minute paper

What is the most significant think you’ve learned from the above? NGL is exciting, new and in many ways not used correctly. NGL is communication/discussions and learning all rolled into one. It is about participating and reading about letting your thoughts run free and about connecting with like minded people and renewing old information and understanding.

What question/problem remains uppermost in your mind? Navigation – how to take it all in? Where to look for certain things – how to connect with the other participants in this course?

Me as a teacher

I am a traditional teacher who is passionate, hard worker and strives to give my best at all times. I am sometimes slow to process things but I am open minded and like to introduce new teaching strategies.

What is your role as a teacher? Who are your students? What is the context? I am a Secondary school science teacher who is also a Head of House. I teacher and mentor approx.. 500 , 11 – 18 year olds. As a teacher I need to model how to behave, work and act appropriately.  I also need to interact with experiments and new ideas and connect students to the wonders of science.

What role does NGL currently play in that context? NGL has an industrial role in my teaching – it is used as a researching tool as well as a storage and catch up tool (Moodle).

How do you think NGL might help? NGL will increase my knowledge and passion for Science, it will help me engage in different styles of teaching and learning. NGL will make my teaching style stand out.

What difficulties might you face with implementation? To implement NGL one needs money and money is hard to come by. Because there is so much information out there about different topic it is very hard to distinguish right from wrong. Other difficulties might be an overload of information and a non kinaesthetic way of learning which is something I will find difficult.

Me as a learner

I am a very hard working person and sometimes stubborn so I will stay doing something until it works or I get it.

What would you like to learn? Why?  I would like to learn how to play a musical instrument – perhaps the harp. I would like to do this because as a teacher when I go to a school function and see students who are approx. 20 years younger then me playing instruments I really admire them. They always seem to enjoy themselves and successful entertain the audience. I love the sound of the music being played and often think to myself  – wow that is so beautiful – I wish I could play like that.

How suited do you think it will be to learning via NGL? What will be the benefits and the barriers?  I think NGL will be very suitable to this learning because there is lots of knowledge out there to help me learn. NGL will help me draw connections and link new learning to past learning, it will help me practice the knowledge I already have and share my experiences with others. However, NGL barriers include wrong information – if I come across information on how to play the harp I won’t know if its right or wrong. As a science teacher I am a very kinaesthetic learner – to my knowledge NGL does not offer any hands on learning just discussions and information which may be a barrier to my understanding.

What is learning?

Learning is requiring knowledge by study – understanding a topic/concept or subject. Learning is interactive and inclusive and can be done by anyone.

Me as a student

Describe your prior experiences as a learner in this program. What did you like? What didn’t work? What haven’t you seen that you would like? I love learning and gaining new knowledge. I work hard to understand new concepts and theories. My prior experience of a learner in this program consisted of reading, mind mapping, kinaesthetic learning note taking, highlighting and rope learning. I like mind mapping – it helps me to connect my thoughts and link one concept/theory to another. It helps me understand things. Rope learning did not work because did not help me understands concepts/theories. During this program I have not see solid communication and discussion of ideas that work in practice.

What is NGL? What do you currently know about it? NGL is people with the same mind set being drawn into a discussion about a certain topic. People communicating and learning from others experiences and insights. There is a lot of technology involved but ideas flow easily.

What have you previously learned that is related to NGL? Lots of things. I regularly use yahoo answers to discuss problems but the most thing that I have probably learned is how to write and reference academic papers.

How have you previously performed your student role? What practices and tools do you use? How do these fit with the idea of NGL and what you know so far of this course? I usually read module guidance set out by lectures, link these guidelines to the academic papers recommended. Print reams and reams of papers and journals, highlighted important points and then linked them into assignment work.

What do you want out of this course? What aren’t you seeing from the course that you’d like to see? I want to become a better listener and academic writer. I want my confidence to be increased when discussing academic matters and finally I want to discover new resources that will help me and others understand things that we may come across in the future.

Student

Wow – where do I start? I just got my head around this blogging thing. So much technology but I suppose we are in the technology age and need to learn to embrace new things (listen to me, I am talking like I am in my eighties not my thirty’s).

When I was in school and even when I first went to University, we wrote notes on books. Teachers and Professors lectured us on things and we read up on them in a text book if we did not understand. We did not have personal computers and our phones were not SMART – just good old block Nokia phones. In school and Uni if I wanted to use a computer I had to go to the computer lab where approx. 30 big Dell or compact computers lived – we mostly used word and excel and maybe checked our emails if we could get the dial up internet working. Oh how things have changed. I started doing my Masters with USQ in 2013 (I am nearly finished now). For each course I have done, I would normally print out all the reading and module booklets – get my highlighter and highlight important points. I find it hard to read journals online – it feels so unnatural. However, learning needs to be connected and withdrawn from many different places that’s why I am doing this course – to learn how to get connected and withdraw important information that I will use in my future.

Now, I see myself using my SMART phone more often – downloading apps, reading professional journals and getting resources from relevant web pages – something five years ago I thought I would never do. I want to expand on this – I want to learn more, that is why I am doing this course.

Although I am a hard worker, stubborn and determine to succeed I do have some fears about this course.

1. I fear that I will not post enough on here to get a good grade in this course – how often/much are we expected to blog? I am already a week behind.
2. There are endlessness sources of information out there – how do we distinguish right from wrong – correct information from incorrect?
3. How will I make my blogs engaging and easy for others to read?
4. I am not an English teacher and not very good at spelling, grammar and/or punctuation (Please feel free to correct me at any time) – if I make mistakes in blogs – will this affect my grade?
5. I fear that I will get the technology bit wrong – are all my technogies (Feedly, diigo etc.) working correctly and connected to the course?

Thank you to Al from Reblog and David for blogging (I hope that’s the correct term) back to me – your advice really helped.

I eagerly await for your replies,

Thanks for reading,

Sharon

NGL

Hi,

I am very new to blogging so help from anyone would be great.