Week 10 !! The End….or…..the beginning ???

Friends, as our collective journey to acquire Webskills comes to an end, I’m full of conflicting emotions !! While I can almost hear my own self heaving a sigh of relief, there’a also a strong sense of achievement that I’ve managed to complete the course reasonably well. I gave it my best shot and barring two weeks when I was down with an illness, I completed all tasks and assignments well in time and to the best of my abilities.

At the same time, I must confess that I’m overcome by an equally strong sense of sadness that from next week onwards we’ll have no more mails from our amazing Instructor Robert nor will I have a daily dose of doing something new, something worthwhile that filled me with the same sense of joy and happiness that I used to feel in my school/college days !!! With this exciting journey which offered all kinds of fascinating and useful materials, tools, applications finally reaching its destination, we shall no longer have any challenging tasks to perform or readings to undertake or discussions to carry on at the Nicenet. In that sense, I’ll greatly miss this class, the discussions, the tasks, Robert’s mails and guidance, assignments and the killer deadlines- it’s a loss that will take some getting used to !!!

If I start talking of the various skills that I acquired through this absorbing course, the list will be pretty long. But most importantly, I think, its helped me to overcome what I’ve often called my ‘tech-terror’ or tech-phobia. I’ve always been apprehensive about using technology: to be honest , technology has never been my forte ; in fact it’s been quite the reverse, it’s been my bug-bear !!. As I’ve also mentioned in my post on Nicenet, my use of technology prior to this course was restricted to using of video, audio clippings or making some power point presentations and using pictures for brainstorming sessions.

But now I can boast of acquiring considerable knowledge and a whole range of skills in using tech tools and applications. I’m going to consolidate my delicious account, I can use blogs, Nicenet, emails, project based learning, interactive power point presentations and a host of other online tools for pedagogic purposes. Indeed, this remarkable course has now equipped me with lots of information, understanding and a bunch of skills that will give me a practical edge in all my future classes and /professional pursuits !! Technology for Multiple Intelligences and Richard Felder’s article are 2 of the many invaluable resources full of practical ideas which we now have at our disposal.

Despite the thrill, excitement and happiness in pursuing this course, I do have some lingering regrets. Chief among them is the inability to produce what I would have regarded as a satisfactory final draft of Project. In addition, missing the opportunity of attending the Webinar and not trying to create a Webquest are other aspects that I regret a lot.

Nevertheless, as this class ends, I feel empowered enough to foster autonomy in my learners and ( to borrow Helen’s words) the Webskills experience has instilled in me a desire for ‘life long learning’. In that sense, I guess many of you will agree with me that the conclusion of this course is by no means an End . Instead it’s the Beginning of our quest to put all the skills we’ve acquired into practical use so that we ourselves and our students can benefit from this wonderful journey that we have been privileged to experience !!

Finally, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the inspiring friends and officials at the RELO in the US Embassy in New Delhi who nominated me for this wonderful course. I also wish to extend my heartfelt thanks to all my fellow participants and other guest moderators. Last but in many ways perhaps most significantly, I feel a deep sense of gratitude to Robert who tirelessly and patiently guided and supported me and always answered each one of my persistent ( and often silly!! ) queries.

warmest regards

Shaila