WEEK 9 : THE MOST MEMORABLE WEEK!

Week 9 is the most important and memorable week, I should say. You know why? Submission of Final Project Report and receiving the feedback.

As soon as I received my project report draft with peer evaluation and suggestions from my project partner Mr. Sergio, I started revising the draft of my project, based on the wonderful suggestions given Mr. Sergio. It took some time to give final touches to the report. I read and re-read the Final Project Report and kept it ready for uploading on Our Wiki.

I would like to appreciate Mr. Sergio for his insightful reading of my project and his useful suggestions. I like this peer evaluation task and it is a great experience.

Then, on Monday and Tuesday I focused on the reading material. I learned a lot about the learning styles and strategies of learners from Howard Gardner’s “Theory of Multiple Intelligences” and “Learning Styles and Strategies” by Richard M. Felder and Barbara A. Soloman. After reading these two articles, I was trying to examine the kinds of learning styles of my students and made a sort of introspection as to what kinds of teaching strategies I use to match the learning styles of my learners. It was really a great experience for me. Then I participated in the discussion on Learning styles and Technology Connections in Nicenet. It was really a rewarding experience to have Mr.Russell Moon in the discussion. He made me think about my teaching styles and the techniques I use in my classroom. Mr. Russell’s suggestions were of great help to me in my classroom teaching. Many times he challenged us to think deep into the various aspects of the learning strategies that the learners may use in their academic tasks. His insightful comments really motivated me to read more about learning styles and how we can use technology tools to help students become independent successful learners.

On Thursday I uploaded my Final Project Report in Our Wiki for evaluation. Today morning , I received the Final Project feedback and rubrics from Ms. Courtney. I was thrilled to read the wonderful comments and the feedback. My heart ‘leaped out of joy’. It was really a great moment in my life !  

Today I visited ‘Shaping the Way We Teach English’ website and I read the articles on ‘Learning Strategies’. I got more elaborate ideas from these articles which I used in my second post in Nicenet discussion.

This week taught me one important principle of teaching which I will never ever forget in my life and I will tell every teacher I come across:

Effective learning takes place when the learning style of the student matches the teaching style of the teacher. So, teachers, design your teaching strategies according to the learning style of the student.  

There is one more week to go.....the e-teacher course is coming to an end. There is a sense of achievement on one side but on the other there’s fear or sadness of losing or missing the joy and excitement that I have had throughout all the weeks ......amidst academic work and official assignments, always like a curious child impatiently waiting for new things, ready to take ‘the road not taken’, and listening to the wonderful voices of all the participants, and Ms. Courtney and other instructors.

Special thanks to Ms. Courtney and Mr. Russell Moon for making this week a great one.

Sasi Raj