Ashley Slaughter

At bare minimum, the instructor can record lectures and ensure that there is a text transcript for lectures available to students to ensure all knowledge is accesible for any student, no matter their disability.

The instructor needs to be aware of different resources for different learning disabilities availabile. 

It is manadated by federal law to allow for accomodations for students with disabilities. This isn't new for me, but my understanding has increased through this module. Accesibility is important for any and all students to be successful, no matter their disabilities. 

This topic hit home for me. My son has aspergers and while I know this is classified as a disability, we try to ensure that he doesn't see it as one. He is successful in school at this point, but he is 7. As an educator, I try to be open and accessable to ensure that my students attain the necessary information to be successful because I know that not all disabilities are visible. I hope that my son always ends up in a situation like this so he can grow to his full potential. 

 Solomon and Schrum (2007) suggest that current educational trends based on standards and tests lean towards teacher-driven instruction while the required 21st-century skills of higher-order thinking skills, application of technology, adapting to change, and workplace skills (among others) require new methods and new assessment measures.

We have kept our educational process the same for quite some time, but our students are changing and thus our teaching strategies need to change. We need to incorporate different methodologies to help engage the different types of learners and also to help prepare them for their desire field of study.

As educators, we have to think about how students access content. We have to think about the end result-acquisition of knowledge- and then develop the design to help facilitate the student's learning.  "Working backwards, instructors then decide which supporting questions should be posed, resources made available, and assessments created to facilitate this process. Finally, the starting point of the course becomes the ending outcome: engaged learning."

"The term "nomadic" has been used to describe the current college students' culture of wireless and mobile connectedness in the sense that they are not "rooted" but incredibly flexible and fluid when it comes to their social connections and their virtual life culture." 

With the increase use of technology, students are more familiar with the use of technology (in many situations, but not all) and learning can take place in a less linear format. 

I know this course is important for me because our curriculum is switching to a blended model. Students are expected to do online learning and demonstrate skills and competencies within the school setting. 

Encouraging peer feedback can be a very useful tool. With the use of an instructor-designed rubric, students can evaluate the work of others and have theirs evaluated as well. Then the students can make corrections that will be beneficial to their assignment. Both students learn and hopefully both students' work improves. 

One thing that really stuck out to me was " Immediate feedback allows students to correct their thought process before it becomes ingrained." As an instructor with a few years of expereince, I know that this isn't always possible and yet I feel like I need to strive to find a way to give this instant feedback. I never really thought about it in this way.