I thought I had been very careful to print out the module sections, and started referring to my hardcopies to keep up with my assignments, but realized that the print feature doesn't actually work for me: each section prints out exactly one page of text and then calls it a day. I had printed out a bunch of first pages to use and in most cases I was missing most of the information. Once I realized this, I went to work, opened up each section of the module, selected all the text and images and pasted them onto a simple text reader. After I had all of the sections added to the text reader I printed that out and at last had a full copy of the text.
But I am alarmed at how essential the internet was to my progress in the class, and how it took only one system failure for everything to grind to a halt. On the home front, it meant that two college careers and one part-time class schedule were in jeopardy. In fact, we don't have any all night cafes in our neighborhood, and we would be in miserable shape to go to school and work the next day if we stayed out somewhere to finish our studies. Not to mention the expense of the coffee and the calories of the morning buns needed to justify our lurking in a coffee shop for hours. Learning is essential in our household, but it makes us extremely vulnerable to any failures of technology.
Another reason I signed up for two online only classes was that I am curious about how online instruction really works. Years ago my son signed up for a homeschooling online program. He failed miserably, partly because none of the software he was provided with actually worked as planned. Teachers switched office hours at will, programs wouldn't open up as needed, and once they did, neither of us could figure out how to negotiate them to get to actual, meaty, factual text. I felt a flash of recognition when I first opened up Angel-learning for the system tutorial: I think this is a newer, much improved, version of the system he was using to homeschool. I made sure to open and use the tutorial over and over; I made sure it worked on my home system, and I log into my classes off and on during the day to make sure I feel at ease with the program. So far so good, until the internet failed me. But still I feel quite uneasy.
Here is my problem: I'm very worried that I am forgetting some deadline, some detail of what to turn in, some reading requirements, etc. etc. I am constantly fighting visual confusion and wondering if I have overlooked a crucial part of my assignment. What also alarms me is that I realize that I have taken to fast skimming of text and have a difficult time going back over it to see where I am actually supposed to produce something. Printing off sections, now that I have learned not to lose any of it, helps, but even then the assignments seem scattered throughout the text and I am left with vague impressions that something still needs doing, but I can no longer find the instructions. Is it just me, or do other online learners have these issues too? How do you manage your assignment details and feel secure that you have completed all of your required work? So far, for Module 1, I have read all of the texts, completed the optional essay writing tests, posted my introduction (and soon this mini-essay), and I am working on my 4 page essay on how the author of my choice approaches his subject and his audience. I have some memory of a journal option, but have lost that reference, so am no longer sure of what I should be doing in that regard. (I am starting a blog with my reflections on the writing process). I didn't make it to Monday office hours because work turned crazy busy for the last half hour. Is there anything else I've missed, folks?
Here's hoping my internet connection remains in good health long enough for me to submit my essay and not have to resort to late night coffee and pastries!
And a parenthetical note after the colored rocks: Once I got to work and reviewed my Module 1 instructions yet again I found what I was looking for, a one page summary of what I needed to do for that Module. Now I have my direction and my measurement of what still needs to be completed and I just need to deal successfully with my writer's block.
Understanding interactive web pages requires a person to form a visual structure in their head that matches the organizational structure of the website. You need to have some sort of sense of where information is located, that you need to click on the button on the top right hand side in order to get to the examples, where you then need to scroll down to the middle to get to your current assignment, etc. etc. Without that visual understanding, I am lost. I used to have an office mate who couldn't get a visual picture of the folder structure of her computer. She would wander around in the wrong folder, trying to find her lost document and would often cry out in frustration, "why is it DOING this?" It's not just a generational thing, either. I have seen my kids, who are definitely brought up in the computer generation, searching and not finding the resources they need in their school's interactive website. Hours can be wasted searching for what is needed, and often they miss out on needed resources and opportunities because they can't find the link to what they need.
So, I am on the right track when I poke through the course website over and over, as this is what will help me, in the long run, fully visualize the structure of information and prevent me from losing essential information.
Honestly, once I sat down and started writing, knowing that I had to turn it in by the next day, it all came clear what I needed to do. :-) Now all I need to learn, for my HTML class, is how to get FTP to work.
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