Composing free and open online educational resources/2008/Critique and feedback

Satisfying Experiences

What was your most satisfying experience as a participant in this course/class? Please provide an example.

• This was actually the first course I took part myself since I am here at Wikiversity. Normally I was just "watching" to create a good learning environment for people. Also that some of the participants are really using Wikiversity (e.g. User:Jtneill who is now being mentored for being a custodian at Wikiversity - if one of you wants to join, go here: Wikiversity:Custodianship.) and hopefully will do so in the future. Thanks to the class I also revived my wiki-blog again. ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:26, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
• I enjoyed the variety of reading and technical assignments. It was fun to start working with video and captioning and ways of sharing self-made audio and video resources. I've got a few ideas of how I might be able to extend this in high school classrooms with my own students. --JHopkins 00:52, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
• This was when I learned to edit and use Wiki's Board and its links to move to my favourite subject which is the complementory medicine, Energy medicine in particular.Moreover, It was very satisfying to me to use the discussion page to ask about the Blog and feed and get answer on my talk page.Thanks. Noura 20:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)--User:NouraRaslan
• I found my way to the online lectures of Professor Lessig and learned to use my own server's blog engine... by the method of trial and error.–JJ 22:50, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
• It was the opportunity to discover what OER is about, and an opportunity to take a look at how various OER initiatives work.--Nichthus 21:38, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
• The most satisfying experience was the "The learning by doing" part of the course.I was looking forward to the following week's assignment, as it was becoming more and more interesting, however more challenging.Anicap 00:07, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• The practical assignments were very useful. For me it was a good way to get familiar with sharing materials in different open forums and writing a blog! –Annika 08:39, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• I liked the mixture of theory and practice - so I not only got to know the concept of OER, I also saw some very good examples & I applied my gained knowledge. User:barbara.braun
• The videoconference at the end of the course was nice - it personalzed some of the participants and made me think that it would have been nice to have met this way in the middle of the course - nice also to hear Hans and Teemus voices!Annika 18:04, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• I agree with Annika. I was a bit apprehensive about the video conference because I'd never done one before, but it was a very positive experience and another good way to learn by doing with another new Web-based communication tool (thanks for another "first"). I left the video conference thinking that it would have been good to have several optional video conferences during the course. It would add a better sense of facilitator and participant presence to the learning experience.--JHopkins 02:14, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Frustrating Experiences

What was your most frustrating experience as a participant in this course/class? Please provide an example.

• problems with the video assignment (from week8):

• the restricting format that commons accepts
• color problems which worked out later, ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

• It would have to be an incident of plagiarism [1] that remains (on the date of this comment) unresolved after my email to him and comment postings to his blog several weeks ago. Hopefully, this individual will appropriately edit his blog and conduct himself in a more honourable manner in future courses. Maybe he'll get around to reading this and be suitably embarrassed. Incidents such as this do nothing to positively promote the Wikiversity experience. I am surprised that his name continues to remain on the course participant listing after this incident was reported to the course facilitators.--JHopkins 01:17, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
• This was when I posted my pictures to Wikiversity commons. I faced alot of difficulties with the licensing issue and committed alot of mistakes while I was trying to upload my photos. May be things will get better with time, when I get more acquainted with the way of getting licenses. Noura 20:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)--User:NouraRaslan
• I got annoyed the most as I was writing my first blog directly to the blog page. After an hour of hard thinking and writing I accidentally pressed some link to move a way from the page and or course my post was lost.–JJ 22:54, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
• Probably the lack of class community. Most of us (all?) are still strangers, despite our use of public blogs. --Nichthus 21:40, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
• The problems I had posting the audio file Anicap 00:13, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• Even if this was a basic course it was a bit hard to do some assignments on the basis of the instructions. Also, sometimes the instructions were a bit different on Wikiversity and on the course blog. It also felt like one had to figure out problems by one self – a bit lonely feeling ...Annika 08:45, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• I was expecting more interaction, communication and feedback. User:barbara.braun

Support

Did you get enough support from the other participants and the facilitators?

• I guess you can never get enough, but all in all it was really less. At the begin I gave more feedback also, but then also from my side it went down. See also later part of here. I added to some blogs comments and I think one or two were never published - who knows why :-) ----Erkan Yilmaz (aka sharp tongue) uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:22, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
• The interactions of all participants seemed to drop off over the last half of the course. I will try to make comments on more blogs in the last week, but full time work and part time grad school leads to a time crunch. I think this may be the case for many people in the course when I look at their positions and diverse interests.--JHopkins 01:23, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
• I have got alot of support from Erkan Yilmaz. I have got also a support from Remi whom I didn't see around Wikiversity except for once or twice.I wish hime really good luck.In fact,I have got also alot of support from the facilitators' course blog and their comments on every week assignment. Noura 20:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)User:NouraRaslan
• About as much as required I think! This is a self-paced and rather individualistic course. --Nichthus 21:40, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
• The facilitators and the participants' comments kept encouraging me to continue the work on the assignments. I always read the other blogs and expected that the others were reading mine, too. Anicap 00:23, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• I think that a concentration on one clear communication channel could have enhanced communication in the course - barbara

What kind of additional support would have been helpful?

• I am writing a paper about Wikiversity and this course (probably an ethnographic case study). I have five questions that I will be emailing to participants during the last week. Getting some responses to these questions would be the "additional support" that will be very helpful to me. I will be happy to share results with interested participants. --JHopkins 01:31, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
• I think that more direct support from Hans and Teemu would be encouraging.On the other hand, I wished to see more involvement from the participants on the discussion page regarding the assignments topics, as well as many general issues about Wiki and the participants. Noura 20:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)User:NouraRaslan
• I agree with Noura's comment above! --Nichthus 21:41, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
• More discussion among the participants. Anicap 00:26, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• I also agree that there could have been more structured support - maby smaller groups that would collaborate with each another.Annika 08:48, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• I think that a synchronous meeting in the beginning or half way through would have been awesome - I knwo it's hard still I would have liked to get that feeling barbara

Think different

If you would be the facilitator of the course/class what would you do differently?

• A kickoff all together, e.g. in chat or by PSTN: could help that people don't leave right from the begin. ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
• Perhaps make it as assignment for each week that a participant must "prove" she has thought about another participant's blog (by e.g. reflecting on the own blog about it) ? But hey: it is a wiki: nothing is a must in the wiki-verse. ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:29, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
• I suggest that this course could be offered again (in six month or yearly intervals maybe). The same weekly assignments could be reused as the "beginner" course, while a new set of weekly assignments could be created as the "intermediate" course for returning participants. Perhaps higher levels (advanced, master, expert) could be written over time to continue to engage a community of learners on this topic. It could be a way of encouraging content development on Wikiversity or other OER projects. --JHopkins 01:42, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
• Well I think that I would give more time to encourage using the discussion page and interconnection between the participants. This could be done either by giving more time for the course or by decreasing the amount of assignments.May be I can replace the assignments with the method of Erkan which is I ask questions and the answer would be small paragraphs. Noura 20:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)--User:NouraRaslan
• ALL comments above get my vote. I would add that an LMS may well have a place to encourage a topic-centred approach rather than the current user-centred one, which has not really helped interaction IMHO. I would also make allowances from time to time for people to catch up, say, a one week 'study break'. --Nichthus 21:43, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
• More work on wikiversity. Anicap 00:36, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
• I agree with Erkan - and I would concentrate on one communication channel barbara

Other impressions and comments

Feel free to speak-up in here.

Did you always follow the assignments ?

• No :-) The course is also for me, it is not fix, I decide also - since it is a wiki. If I found something as not so interesting, I changed the assignment for me a little, e.g. week7 with the audios: instead one podcast or the additional fun section. ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 18:35, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
• Yes, as possible as I could. Anyhow,the last week was exceptional. I felt that we are in a race.But, to be fair,I found alot of facility from Wiki. They were ready to accept us as we are.I think that Wiki made an idea about each one of us and accordingly they built their judgement on our assignments. Noura 20:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)--User:NouraRaslan
• No I did not. I did not even read all the material that there was. Because there was SO much of it. It gets confusing from time to time... The reason being that with limited time I cannot first study and the respond, write the answer etc., I must do all things simultaneously. As I jump from site to site my process evolves and turns into a something unpredictable. –JJ 23:14, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
• I did make an effort to follow the assignments and review the resources. However, I did take a few shortcuts in the audio and video assignment weeks. I didn't check out all of the links that were on the lists. But, I guess I balanced this by doing slightly more than required on another week when I posted more photos than required. --JHopkins 04:09, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
• In principle, yes! I used some media that I had already taken for the photos and video exercises, but still learned valuable skills about adding them to an OER repository. I think this is a reasonable flexibility. --Nichthus 21:45, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
• Yes, I did. However, I often wandered around trying to figure out things which were not a requirement Anicap 00:39, 9 May 2008 (UTC).

some more questions and answers

• see here (in the hope also some others see the questions), ----Erkan Yilmaz uses the Wikiversity:Chat (try) 20:03, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
• see Wikiversity; or education meets the free culture movement: An ethnographic investigation. This article was published in First Monday, Volume 13 Number 10 - 6 October 2008.--JHopkins 00:58, 2 November 2008 (UTC)