Red Pod Meeting 27 October, 2009

I am afraid I was a little late joining the group tonight as I have been very unwell. I was well aware that I needed medical attention (having an asthma attack) but felt I needed to fulfill my part of the assignment before I left!!!! I battled through and really appreciated the support of my fellow RedPod Members and their care and concern that preceeded into the next few days. The document is finally ready to go.......!!!

RedPod Meeting - 26 October 2009

Tonight was the night when the group had planned to get together to make our CIO Recommendations. I must admit this night did not seem at times like it was ever going to happen. I think this assignment has been particularly hard for all of us, not just because we were juggling work, family and study commitments but also because most of the time we were not sure if we were heading in the right direction.

We met tonight using Etherpad (this time it worked) and it was good because we could all share our ideas on the whiteboard colloboratively. There were some issues with Etherpad "dropping out" at times but at least we were able to get the project going.

I liked being able to work colloboratively with the others. Sometimes you know what you want to say but not sure how to word it and it was good to write ideas down on the whiteboard in Etherpad and then ask for suggestions on how to improve it.

I also liked the way how all our group were respectable to one and other and no-one dismissed other people's ideas. Generally speaking, we worked well together and we were able to accomplish the task (although it took several hours tonight and isn't quite finished)

Red Pod Meeting - 17 October, 2009

Tonight Ben was unable to meet with the group and initially it was just Lesley and I. I had not used Wordpress before and had limited experiences setting up a blog or even using one for that matter and Lesley was able to show me how to create pages and link them. I felt a bit silly having to ask how to do it - but was refreshed a little later when Liz came online and asked the same thing. I was very proud that I was able to impart the information that Lesley shared with me onto Liz.

RedPod Meeting -

Tonight Lesley and I just met and discussed our progress. I had done some research on Facebook and discussed with Lesley what I had done so far. From speaking with Lesley I had more inspirations on what to write and research so was soon on my way again to find out more information.

RedPod Meeting 3 10 October 2009

We received confirmation back from Ken today that the group was on the right track, which was good news for us all.

Tonight, we discussed ways we have experienced colloborative learning work in the classroom - addressing the advantages and disadvantages.

As decided at an earlier meeting we all were going to "take" one online networking site and do research on it. My task is to research Facebook - I plan to begin looking at relevant sides in the very near future.

Meeting 2 7 October, 2009

At tonight's meeting Ben was able to join us - and we informed him of what we had discussed in the previous meeting and how we thought we would approach it. This brought about a whole set of new questions as to whether or not we were approaching the task correctly, were we answering the questions sufficiently and so on. After what seemed like hours of pondering and discussing it was decided that we should contact our lecturer, Ken, and seek guidance to ensure that we were on the right track. Liz volunteered to be the one to do that.

I have to be honest I am feeling somewhat confused (as I think my whole group may be as well) and not sure what I am meant to be doing or how I am going to achieve it! I am hoping when we receive the response to Liz's questions to Ken we will feel a tad more reassured.

I hope!!!

RedPod Meeting 2 October 09

After the failed Etherpad attempt to meet the group decided that it would be a good idea to try to meet again but this time use Skpe as the online networking tool. We thought Skype might be slightly more reliable and that it was! We had to meet later in the evening because one of our group members is based in Darwin and we needed to accomodate the time difference.

I was a little concerned about our RedPod formation as we have five members, Myself, Lesley, Liz, Ben and Shin. I had not had any previous contact with Shin, nor had I seen her on the CSU Forum, in fact, the only way I learnt of Shin's existence was when the groups were formed and that name was on the list. Nevertheless, not wanting to exclude any of our members from meeting we decided to post our intention to meet on the CSU forum for which, Ben was unable to attend and we did not hear anything once again from Shin.

During this meeting Liz, Lesley and I discussed how we would approach the task. We decided to form a group blog (using wordpress) as a colloborative tool. We also decided to each take one online networking tool each (for example, skype, second life, facebook etc) and using the assignment questions as a guide research that particular networking site and post our findings to the group blog. Lesley kindly offered to set up the group blog.

Having feeling as though we accomplished something tonight we left with plans to meet again in the near future to discuss progress.

Meeting (A) Redpod Group

Shortly after submitting the first assignment for this unit I decided to take the initiative and contact my fellow red group members to set up a meeting to discuss assignment 2.

I posted the idea onto the CSU forum and both Lesley and Liz replied. We decided to meet using Etherpad the following night. When the time came to meet I went to log into Etherpad but found for some reason I couldn't. Thus, I spent a frantic hour trying to work out why I couldn't access Etherpad as well as posting messages on the forum informing my fellow group members why I suggested the meeting and was a no show.

It turned out that the others in the group also had problems with Etherpad as well - so at least that made me feel a bit better. I guess no matter how reliable the person is, sometimes technology can be a tad unreliable.!!

LC Moo 2 September, 2009

I was very enthusiastic to try moo as even though I had heard of it, had never used it.

Due to other work commitments I only was able to access my emails with my user name and password, a short time before the meeting began. It took a couple of attempts for me to actually get into the program and then finding the room in which the meeting was taking place was another issue! I felt totally out of depth using this program as I had no idea what to do, how to do it, where to do, or even why I was doing it!!! When I finally found where my fellow students were at the meeting was already in progress by the time I arrived.

As the assigment was looming I figured that tonight's chat would be about the assignment. That did not happen. I guess I attribute that to my earlier point that when there is a large group of people in a chat the discussion can tend to get lost and it seems like there is no one driving it.

As one requires an invitation, user name and password to enter the site I would imagine that Moo would be fairly secure for students to use. I can imagine them finding the process engaging as they more around virtual rooms etc.

I would say my Moo experience was not something that I enjoyed, but would use it again with my students (providing I was able to broaden my knowledge of the site).