I was going to begin this post with an enthusiastic “Greetings Pedagogues!” However from what my dictionary tells me, a pedagogue is “a teacher, esp. a strict or pedantic one.” So rather than accuse you all of being pedantic and dull, how about I say “greetings fellow online learners” instead.
By way of an introduction, my name is Mike Bogle and I am one of the mentors for the Program for Online Teaching (POT). I’d like to thank Lisa Lane for asking me to participate in the course. I’m really looking forward to the 24 weeks ahead.
In terms of my background, I am Educational Technologist for the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of New South Wales (my staff profile here). My primary role at UNSW is to assist staff with the exploration of learning technologies, as well as help staff effectively integrate their use into the curriculum.
By “learning technologies” I mean just about any tool or system that can enhance or benefit the learning and teaching process. This can range from local systems such as large scale learning management systems like Blackboard and Moodle, to digital media, to collaborative tools like wiki’s, to personal learning environments such as blogs, Twitter, social media, virtual environments and the like.
There is enormous potential in this area, and yet many questions as well. My job is to help make sense of the technical landscape, and then having done that, help people put it to good use. So this is what I’m hoping to bring to the POT as well.
In terms of my various online hangouts, there are a few notable spaces to mention:
- Diigo: http://www.diigo.com/profile/mbogle
- Twitter: http://twitter.com/mike_bogle
- YouTube: http://youtube.com/mikebogle
So without further ado, let the fun begin.
Hi Mike,
Thanks for your message and for agreeing to be my mentor for the POT certificate. I am sure I will learn a great deal this year and I can see from your links and youtube channel that you will be a great person to contact should I have any questions about Blackboard or other things. I find it so interesting that we have a number of people in the program from so far away, like Australia and New Zealand. It makes me excited to think how many people or students one can reach with an online format. So, if I understood the purpose of a Diigo account correctly, it aggregates and shares my bookmarks of web sites with anyone who is subscribed or has a feed to my account. Is that correct? I’m thinking this is a useful and fast way for an instructor to give links to students, but maybe you can fill me in on some of the other applications of Diigo. Thanks again for your comment and I will try to keep the tasty and interesting Italian links coming throughout the semester.
Jacqualine
p.s. you did have my blog site URL correct.
It is http://jjdyess.edublogs.org
Hi Jacqualine, I nearly missed your comment here – sorry about that!
Regarding Diigo, yes that’s right. One of the main purposes of the site is to share useful sites and resources with others. I know many people who also use it as a primary means for bookmarking things for themselves, however the site’s public nature means that nearly anyone can benefit from the indexing we do with our accounts.
There are also some really neat ways of annotating web pages so others can see your thoughts. The process acts much like a sticky note and is visible to other Diigo users who visit the same page.
Some information on use of sticky notes is available here:
http://help.diigo.com/how-to-guide/sticky-note
Hey Mike, I look forward to learning from and sharing with you. Thanks for mentoring me.
My blog URL http://kimsthinking.blogspot.com
Kim
Hi Kim, It’s my pleasure Glad to see another Aussie in the course!