Midpoint is eagerly anticipated, because it means I've made it this far, and I know time will quickly march on to the end of yet another- hopefully successful- semester for my students and myself. There is this nebulous feeling I experience before midpoint. After all, if I'm not doing so well in a class, I can just drop. Right? With my type A personality, the answer would likely be a resounding NO!!!! if I found myself in that quandary. After midpoint, it feels as if I've come too far to go back, and there is so much invested that it is necessary to keep pressing on toward the prize. Anxiety is also sometimes provoked by the approach of midpoint, especially if I have students who are struggling and are likely to be unsuccessful. My philosophy is that no student should ever fail a course unawares. While it may seem harsh to tell a student they are at risk of failing, I believe it is horrifically unkind to not have that conversation. That said, I never relish those discussions, and often pray that the students will begin to improve before I have to speak with them.
Another reason I sometimes dread midpoint is that the day, circled in red on my calendar as the last day to drop without penalty, seems to be when the energy switch is flipped. Moons have been described as waxing and waning.
The waxing moon seems to be growing, like a candle wick being dipped in the wax over and over again, growing larger and more useful. Conversely, the waning moon grows smaller and smaller until it seems to disappear, becoming almost irrelevant in the rush to another cycle. I see this effect play out each semester, in my role as teacher, and as student. As teacher, the excitement in the classroom begins fresh and new, growing as learning occurs. Students become engaged, relationships are created and fostered, and learning becomes relevant and applicable. Then midpoint comes, and students begin to focus on just getting done. Class time is endured rather than celebrated, and although I know my job is to be a helper of learning so they don't need me anymore, there is a definite twinge of yearning as students set their eyes away from me, ready to have this class over and move on to the next. Do I fault my students for this? No, because I see the same in my own role as student.
And thus, here I am, two weeks after midpoint, one week after Spring Break. My energy is failing, and I'm trying to dip in the wax of knowledge in order to continue to meet both the needs of my students and my own personal learning needs. Perhaps this symbolic phenomenon of the moon cycle is to blame, but the two most recent things accomplished toward meeting my personal learning goals felt much more effortful than necessary. I participated in a final webinar that I thought would help me improve my own personal online teaching. The webinar was provided by the University System of Georgia, and I will give credit to the speaker, Dr. Katie Mercer, for being incredibly informative and organized. Her presentation was so clear, and the work she has done lays a foundation that other institutions would be wise to reproduce. However, I think I failed to extrapolate from the title what would be covered. As a result, I was disappointed. The title was: Distance Education: Implementing Design and Delivery Standards in an Online Program Area. I mistakenly thought I would gain tips and advice to do this in an individual course. Instead, the webinar provided information on how Dr. Mercer had accomplished this in a program within a university. I do have to give her kudos as she individually reviews all the courses taught to make sure the standards are being met. I began to wane even further when I considered the workload involved in that. Despite my own disappointment with this, I do recommend this webinar, especially if your institution needs to implement standards. The link to the webinar can be found below.
My final action to be completed was creation of a Piktochart infographic. I will honestly admit that I was not looking forward to this. I had explored creating one before, and gave up because it seemed so difficult. But-----I recently read that meaningful learning is effortful, and that it is important as a teacher to stretch yourself. Thus, I pressed on to achieve this final goal. I was successful in that I created one. However, if true learning is effortful, then I sure better have learned a lot!!!! I did not find the site to be intuitive or easy- even though their site promised that it will be. I realize that one benefit of this type of site is to give students more control over their learning, to provide an interactive way to progress through content, and to meet the needs of diverse ways of learning. I've also learned to use Prezi this semester, and I think that I could have done the same thing a whole lot easier. I'm willing to concede that learner error or resistance could play a part in my experience. I may poke around in there again in the future when I've got more time, energy, and motivation. Perhaps when the moon waxes again I'll be more inclined. If you're interested, check out the link below and give it a whirl. I've provided a link to the website, and to what I created. Trust me when I say to not get excited. I suspect my minimalistic efforts will completely underwhelm you.
That said, the creation of the Piktochart heralds the completion of my personal learning plan. Therefore, it is time to
This assignment is completed, and I am the richer and more well-rounded for the experience.
USG Webinar: https://youtu.be/2T8HGCmoQ4k?list=PLD67rXjM2i0YphqLiQ9kgqpiP4J-PWACX
Piktochart Website: http://piktochart.com/
My Piktochart on Professionalism in Nursing: https://magic.piktochart.com/output/12362293-untitled-infographic
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