Another Day in the HR Field

I am taking my last official class, an elective, ( Encouraging Communication in Online Courses ) before my practicum this semester towards my Master of Online Teaching certificate. I thought I would share my findings on a technology I explored as a follow-up to the series I posted throughout the summer. After watching: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWfvqkkk0yM My instructor asked if I thought Second Life could be an "Exciting & Dynamic Opportunity to enhance communication" -Perhaps. I am still exploring in my mind how I could use it in my HR, OB, & OD classes. I spent the evening last Friday exploring Second Life with my 10 year old son. Since I was a first timer, I thought his experience might be helpful to me as I attempted to learn how to get around and such. He has played in many similar venues over the last few years such as Wizard 101, Lord of the Rings Online, Animal Crossing, and Roblox, etc. I did not pay the extra money to get the advanced vers...

For the last few weeks I have been blogging about a my takeways from a class I am taking for my Master of Online Teaching Certificate from UIUC's online learning curicullum. As you can tell from my posting, I have learned a great deal and really enjoyed taking this course and sharing with my readers. This post will be the end all be all for the series labeled Teaching/Training with Technology. I hope you will look for my next Mini Series about Horrible Bosses as I and my summer Organizational Behavior students will have a few things to say to help educate the real time bosses who don't play the role but live the role of "boss" everyday. The following is a list of the top 23 most important things I think online instructors need to know or learn. This list assumes that the instructor is new to online teaching as I use my own list of "wish I had knowns". 1) First, instructors need to spend some time learning how to use whatever their web tool is for online ins...

Happy Summer! If your in the Midwest right now like I am your trying to figure out how to cool off about every 5 minutes or so. Well I have been discovering some very cool stuff this week but unfortunately it won't make me feel any better in this heat. It will however, help me to be a more inspiring, interesting, and possibly even entertaining educator and presenter. The first new discovery was a very NON-POWERPOINT way of presenting slides. Prezi is the new wave of slide presentations that can literally take your audience down a rabbit hole (just check the site linked to this blog title). The second most powerful thing I learned is don't ever trust your equipment. While trying to develop a Twitter for HR presentation for my students, I could not get my sound to work. This is equipment that was only used once before mind you. After three unsuccessful times (so I thought) I gave up and posted the assignment saying it is only half done. After posting, I discovered t...

Well this is my second post in a series for the class I mentioned in my first post. My scrapbook so to speak! I am now at the end of week one and just posted my reflection for this weeks module. My number one learning (teachable moment) from this week came from a website experience that I linked to this weeks title (Diigo). It's a bookmark site where you can keep track of great articles you read, sites you browse and want to go back to or just anything of interest. I am still trying to digest it's use in the class or within the HR profession but it was an interesting new find. The second thing that was a bit more concerning and will require me to do some more research is taking into consideration FERPA when requiring students to open a twitter or linked in account as part of their deliverables. I have certainly not considered this before because it is my understanding that the law is related to privacy of grades and how one is doing in the class. I don't see my current...

I know at least my twitter followers are aware that I have been incorporating technology into my teaching for a while now as they have watch several posts go by with #UIS431 in them. However, if you don't learn something new every day we tend to get a little stale. I am working on a Master Certification in Online Teaching. This summer I am taking course 3 & 4 out of 6 required towards that goal. I am learning about student assessment and teaching technology. As homework for the technology course, over the next seven weeks I will be taking a class requiring me to blog more than I do (currently once a month) and specifically highlighting new technologies that I am learning about. Specifically, my blog is going to be my scrapbook with at least the following items: -social networking/media -a tool for asynchronous communication -a tool for synchronous communication -an example of ready-made content -some content you've produced on your own -whatever your produced in the 7...