Sandra

=2007 Learnscope Project=

Hi, my name is Sandra and I am a Trainer with the YWCA. I have been involved in delivering modules from the IT and Business training packages. I am also an eBay trainer and love to spend my time shopping online (and in real shop, of course).

At present I am involved in two Work-for-the-Dole Projects, the SCRAP Shop and Sustainable Living.

toc
 * The SCRAP Shop** is a Reverse Garbage centre which collects recyclable materials from local business and either resells the sorted products direct to local community groups and schools or uses the various materials in shop manufacturing projects. Participants in the SCRAP Shop are able to undertake training in OH&S, retail skills, business skills and IT as well as being involved in our creative manufacturing projects. Items made in the SCRAP Shop are either sold directly from the store or listed on eBay.


 * Sustainable Living** is a book and drama project created to bring community members from East Nowra together to write a resource about the skills required to live on a low income. The broad topics covered in the book are also being incorporated into a theatrical production which is being written and performed by local residents highlighting the serious and (hopefully) the lighter side of life. The launch of the book resource and the drama will be at the Nowra Players Theatre on 28th August 2007.

Proposed Learning
During this Learnscope project I hope to:
 * create a blog and wiki to assist the team to maintain a record of our learning and progress throughout the project.
 * Completed & ongoing - http://ytrainingnsw.edublogs.org/ (July 07)
 * http://sandralothian.edublogs.org/ (Oct 07) I am using this blog as a personal explanation of the YWCA programs I have been involved in.


 * use Yacapaca to create a few on-line revision tools for some of the modules delivered regularly in the SCRAP Shop.
 * http://www.chalkface.com/info/yacapaca-authoring/ - chalkface is an online authority community (created for use in secondary education in the UK) BUT it is a completely FREE online tool for creating pre-assessment or assessment tools. It was created for the K-12 community but can easily be adapted to adult learning in Australia. You can join an established authority group or create your own group. Please explore! (July 07)
 * I have created my own authoring group called YWCA and have started to enter assessment questions. After a group of questions have been created, I will assemble them into an assessment quiz.


 * Learn how to subscribe to RSS feeds - completed (I think)
 * Keep updated with RSS feeds with IE7 [[file:RSS feeds.doc]] (July 07)

I also hope to find a free webhosting service that I can use to create a moodle site which will incorporate some sample on-line training tools. If you know of one, please let me know! - **October Update** - The search for a free webhosting service did not go ahead as this does meet YWCA organisational requiements.

SCRAP Shop eBusiness YQuest Trainer**
 * Links to our current YWCA Shoalhaven wikis

Yacapaca
I have been investigating the use of the British designed Chalkface Project to develop online assessment tools. https://www.chalkface.com/info/about/ http://demo.yacapaca.com/

Part of this project is an online program called ‘Yacapaca’ which allows a user to join or create an authoring group related to your area of interest. In the group you can write assessment questions, using various formats, and assemble the questions into a quiz, then join the quizzes into course assessments. The quizzes can also be used individually. Students are added, assigned certain quizzes or courses by the teacher and given a private login username and password generated by Yacapaca. As they complete their assigned tasks, the online system securely records their results for the teacher.

This all sounds great but I am yet to trial it. I will let you know how I go.....

After searching and questioning (one fault with the Yacapaca system is that the internal group messaging system seems to be generally ignored), I have come to the conclusion that Yacapaca is a great system for use face to face (classroom situations) and also e-learning learning. The system on the whole is quite complex, requiring many hours of trial and error to get things right. While most screens offer a short video (without sound!) to help you through the learning process, the online documentation falls a long way short of being useful.

The Yacapaca demo video (link above) give you an overview of the system (also without sound - why is this so?) but does not offer any details on how to actually use the system. I have used some of the screen shots in the video, added other screenshots and included some detail in this linked document to give you a better understanding of how Yacapaca works.

Example of a timed quiz multiple choice quiz question

End of quiz score

Authoring screen where you create quizzes, course and other types of questions.

Quiz analysis

**Yacapaca Trial Outcome**

 * Yacapaca is a very useful elearning assessment tool. It can be used as evidence of accredited training (by downloading student submissions and assessment results) or it could be used as a source of revision material prior to assessment.
 * Students get a secure online login and can personalise their space by creating an e-portfolio.
 * Teachers have access to all student assessments at all stages and can open or lock results.
 * The timed quiz questions may be a problem to students with numeracy and literacy problems, but the time for reading and answering questions can be adjusted. You could also choose not to use quizzes at all and go with short text questions.
 * The greated advantage in the system is the access to questions, quizzes and course that have been created by others and the ability to tailor all of them items to your own needs. NOTE: if you change a question or course, any previous use pre-editing is retained.
 * The whiteboard is an excellent tool for class situations and could conceiably be used online through Discovere or Illuminate

Impact of Web2 tools on learners
Through my work in this project and various other YWCA programs I have introduced a range of learners to Web2 tools such as wikis, blogs and photo shareing tools such as Photobucket and Flickr. The impact of these tools has been immediately recognised by most learners who were eager to "give it a go". The use of wikis and blogs to document project work has given these learners a "voice" on the internet which they otherwise would not have had the opportunity or skills to develop themselves. http://monikha-yquest.wikispaces.com/ http://yquest.wikispaces.com/Dale

I believe that the use of Web2 tools has increased their confidence and allowed them to use the internet in a more interactive way. Leaners usually receive content from their teacher/trainers verbally or in hardcopy and return content directly to the teacher/trainer via written and observed skills. The use of the internet via email and Web2 tools allows our learners to add content such as videos, podcasts and written content that can be shared with other learners which ultimately expands everyones learning.

I also presented a Website design and Wikispaces workshop to a group of Shoalhaven business people to demonstrate the use of FREE Web2 tools and how these can be applied to business to reduce costs. The workshop was well received with many people indicating that they could take control of their own internet presence for the first time rather than relying on the expertise of web designers. Some also indicated that they could retain their exsiting website but incorporate a link to a wiki which they could update themselves, an example would be a monthly newsletter. http://ebiz.wikispaces.com/

Overview of Learnscope 2007
On the whole the Leanscope 2007 experience has been very positive for me. I have :
 * assisted the project as co-facilitator as well as a participant
 * Attended various learning and brainstorming workshops
 * Worked individually and in groups on developing elearning tools for the YWCA NSW
 * Trialed Yacapaca assessment tools with learners
 * I have also taken part in a Learnscope presentation to a national gathering of YWCA staff at which I gave an overview of our Ytrainingnsw training blog http://ytrainingnsw.edublogs.org/. This demonstration lead to the creation of another blog for our Encore Program http://yhealthwellbeing.blogspot.com/

I feel I have developed more skills as a leader and team member that I can incorporate into the programs that I am engaged with for the YWCA as well as pass on Web2 Skills to all our program participants.

=**2006 Learnscope Project**=
 * [|Here is a link to my blog]

Here is a link to Irfranview - a great piece of free software to edit photographs http://www.download.com/IrfanView/3000-2192_4-10491149.html?tag=pop

Thanks Sandra....the software looks great......this is a good example of using a wiki to share knowledge 1161213489

We are currently developing our SCRAP Shop Wiki (Shoalhaven Creative Re-Use Action Project). Here is the link** scrapshop

I have discovered recently a free program which can be used to create and host elearning. My son's school is using it. I am yet to fully investigate, but it looks interesting! I believe it is run from a hosted website. Here is a link to the Moodle Wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moodle http://docs.moodle.org/en/About_Moodle http://docs.moodle.org/en/Installing_Moodle
 * MOODLE**

Hi Tony Can you tell me how you put the Site Map on the home page - I cannot see it when I "edit the page"?

Hi Sandra I'm assuming you are referring to the Table of Contents (?) Go to the Use Text Editor button and you will see the code for creating a table of contents (page site map) toc (must be lower case) enclosed in square brackets ... creates a table of contents Title/headings created using the = symbol will automatically include them in the table of contents Hope this helps Tony