This is a my reflection on the first groupwork activity to find a number of eportfolio drivers from a given reading list. What has been driving eportfolios forward in the UK, USA, Europe etc.
My experience of group work online and Trevor's opening comments,
"I have to say from the outset that working together online can be difficult sometimes, BUT, with a little planning on everyone's part, it can actually be a rewarding experience. You never know, you may even enjoy it ;o)",
left me a little concerned especially when there was little activity in the conference over the first few days.
As for the task in hand I did not find it at all easy, a page of web links to read and trying to ascertain what were the relevant drivers from all this was a little confusing. Do I print? Certainly not it was clear from the outset. I found myself easily distracted and I wandered off. I posted a number of additional messages in the conference and suddenly there was life. My first attempt at spotting the drivers for the USA was posted other inputs started to appear. I found the reading was a bit difficult to concentrate on although once I focused on just spotting the drivers it wasn't so bad.
In terms of my PDP I would like to focus on my Research related competencies it was clear I was trying to read too much detail and not focusing on the actual task after all we were only after the drivers. I was distracted into RefWorks did I need to sort out my referencing? Along came an email with contact updates so my Google contacts were updated. A quick scan at what else I had to do and it was clear I had to focus back on the task. I must stop allowing myself to be side tracked. Just something as simple as checking my emails before I start studying can distract me from getting on with my studies. I conscious have tried to stop checking my mail until after the study period. One other slight distraction is my job of course, preparing my own lessons and planning the weekly teaching commitments means setting a regular study period is not easy.
Whilst my technology skills are pretty good, well I think they are. I was suffering a bit from information overload I thought I was on top of the course then I checked the Wiki and found I had missed a task out completely. I guess blogs, wikis, google docs etc will all become as natural as driving a car. I must admit though I am struggling to see the use of Twitter but then again Facebook took a while for me to accept.
Once a fellow student put up the post suggesting a Wiki it was clear we had to start moving forward. The Wiki was the trigger point. A reading list was added as suggested by other students in the group. This was my first attempt at using a Wiki and I have to say it was quite straight forward. I did however find it easier to produce the HTML in Frontpage rather than the Wiki editor. This enabled me to copy and paste the HTML straight into the wiki. I posted a gentle warning message in an attempt to trigger some activity, this received a response on the Friday evening.
Personally I was now able to pick a few documents and read them solely to spot the drivers which suddenly wasn't that bad. I was able to also start looking for useful sources of information for the TMA essay, bit early yet though. The activity in work group picked up and text started to appear on the groups wiki. I have to confess I printed some of the main sources to enable a relaxing read on the sofa, I still can't get used to performing everything on a PC.
When I reviewed some of the other messages in the group it was clear to me that I was more active than most I guess I have seen many online activities fail on previous courses so I wanted to do my bit to try and get it started. I made a conscious decision to back off a bit and posted a message to that effect. I was aware that I had steered this activity some what and I didn't want to appear pushy.
At the moment we are steering towards the end of this activity with our template looking OK it perhaps could do with a few more drivers but there are still a couple of days left for a few latecomers to add a bit.
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