Week 3 Reading

This week's reading is from:
West, Richard E., Wright, Geoff, Gabbits, Bruce, & Graham, Charles R. (2006). Reflections from the introduction of blogs and RSS feeds into a preservice instructional technology course. TechTrends, 50 (4), 54-60.

I apologize to my colleagues for the past week's lack of interaction. I was in the process of resigning my position after eight years of employment and seemed to become immersed in a little bout of depression/anxiety. I'm not sure why as my new position will provide an opportunity to use my eLearning skills from the past year and improve and enhance my skills in the future. I know that I will miss the wonderful volunteers that I have known and worked closely with and the dedicated staff I leave behind, but once a GS always a GS.

As I read West's findings, I felt a deep empathy for the students struggling with the blogs and related with their feelings of information overload! I must confessed that I grew up in the day when, for your tenth birthday, you received a diary AND every year after that until you asked your mom to tell your aunt not to buy another one!

I am a voracious reader, but I have never gotten into the habit of journaling - I have purchased many forms of journals throughout the years (diary vs journal? not much difference to me!) from the composition books to cloth bound varieties and usually write the purchase the date and, then end of giving them to my daughter or anyone else who needs paper.

I really like the RSS feeds and agree with the authors that you do not read everything, but pick and choose your links carefully otherwise you end up in the hinterlands. My favorite is The Rapid elearning Blog - while working in a non-profit it became an invaluable resource for using PPt in designing visuals.

From my personal experience, I feel the same as those learners in 2004 - very overwhelmed with all the information and new technologies available - I am reminded of the knight in one of the Indiana Jones movies who advise to "choose wisely" or we may find ourselves going down the rabbit hole and becoming lost in the maze of Blogs and RSS feeds.

One thing that I thought was interesting is that we really need to remind ourselves that just going out there and finding a Blog does not mean that we have found the answers - we have found someone's ideas and opinions that are open for discussion and reflection - let's be sure we do that.