Online conference MM10

Welcome back to my blog!!

I have to warn you that this is going to an end... But, before I reflect on the idea of what meaningful has been to me this subject, I would like to tell you about the last challenge we did on 4^th of May. I took part in my first online conference, thanks to the invitation of my ICT teacher María Jesús García @mjgsm, who allowed us to participate in MM10.

For those who don’t know, MM10 is a course for teachers, from Moodle, in which educators get together, so as to instruct, learn, integrate technology in daily teaching, collaborate, exchange cultural aspects, be facilitators, etc. Moodle is a free and online learning management system for educators and institutions. It was designed to allow teachers to create their online classes and extend their knowledge.

The online conference was named Open Educational Digital Projects for CLIL Primary Education, the main objective was explaining the audience the experience that each one of us had concerning the ICT course from the Master's Degree in Bilingual Education, at Rey Juan Carlos University (Vicálvaro-Madrid), including the learning diaries we created. Nelly Deutsch @nelliemuller was the person in charge of the conference, the organizer. In fact, she organizes MOOCs (Moodle and Second Life) and free online conferences among other things. The audience was composed by all my colleagues from the Master's Degree and educators around the world (France, Mexico, Canada, etc.)

I have to say that the conference was not the first step we took. Two weeks before the conference, we started preparing it. First of all, we had to complete a presentation in Google Drive designed by my teacher, so that we prepare our slide to support our speech, which was uploaded to Slideshare. In so doing, we had to mention our learning diaries, and our Open Educational Projects (OEP: Matter in our world!). Moreover, we had to name the way the audience can contact us.

Open educational digital projects for clil primary education from Jefe de Área de Formación en Red y Redes Sociales. INTEF

Once I had the slide prepared, it was time to prepare the speech itself. In order to do so, what I did was go back to all the learning diary entries, and try to compile the information provided in each post, in several sentences; therefore, I focused on explaining the aim of each challenge, alongside its development and what I learnt from it. 

Here you have the draft created by Issuu:

Then, I was ready for the online rehearsal with my teacher and colleagues, which took place on the 27th of April. In order to practice it, we met at WizIQ, which is an online delivery learning platform intended for instructors, to deliver their interactive teaching lessons. As a result, we practiced our speeches, as well as the management of audio and micro settings.

And, finally, he big day came!

The conference started at 4 p.m. until 8 p.m. approximately. It took place in WizIQ, as the rehearsal. Nelly Deutsch introduced the conference and our teacher, then our teacher gave an introduction about our master course. She was in charge of allowing us permission to appear on the screen and talk. Due to the fact that the platform included a chat, while we were talking, we were encouraged to provide the URLs of the learning diaries of our colleagues through it. Likewise, the chat was used to pose questions and comments about our explanations. Besides that, we were spreading the world on Twitter #moodlemooc10.

I have to mention that unfortunately, I had problems with the sound so I could not complete my speech. It was a pity because I have been preparing the conference for a while but at least I could see my classmates work live and stereo.  

Here you have my screenshot from the conference:

And the video of the online conference which was upload to YouTube. Hope you like it!

Self- reflection

To be honest, I was so nervous while waiting for the conference to start. However, as soon as the conference started, I felt really comfortable. It was the first time I participated in such an event, and I highly recommend it. By doing this challenge, I could really realize the power of technology, since it brings together people from all over the world, by a click.

Moreover, it was extremely motivating, as we were able to present our Open Educational Projects to the world, the projects we have been working on for months, and what is more important, to receive feedback from it not only from the teacher but also from our classmates.

I learnt a lot from my colleagues, since I jot some notes down from catching activities in their projects, which I hope I will be able to adapt and apply in my future classroom. Taking part in this online conference made me think about the idea of “shared knowledge”. Being able to share what you know with people who is in the same position as you in just one click. Too easy to be true!

Finally, I have to admit that taking part in this conference woke my curiosity up in learning about how to use this platform called WizIQ, in order to deliver online classes in the near future, and be able to join other courses and participate in more online conferences. I really think that teaching this way students will work on the skills that the 21st century demands, the likes of: capacity to present yourself to the world, to be precise and brief, to try to convince the audience, to make them be interested, etc; therefore, this will be a starting point to develop such skills.