Maximizing Impact_ Nonprofit Website Planning, Budgeting, and Design.pdf
Personal Reflection 2
1. TAYAO, Ada Marie S. EDUC190 Personal Reflection 2
2008 – 16167 Sir Noel Feria September 24, 2010
Applications
Just like I shared before, my pre-conceptions on educational technology or
technology in education was the use of technology to mainly just make presentations or
teaching materials. Also, when I hear the words “classroom management”, I usually
think of controlling students’ behaviour and discipline, or making sure that the
environment in a classroom is conducive for learning. Here in EDUC190, these words
were given a new use, in a different context. It was in the lecture on classroom
management systems that I learned that online group or class areas for learning were
not limited to Yahoo! Groups or to Google Groups. There were other options of
classroom management systems, like Moodle and classjump.com, which were far more
specific and contained practical features that teachers can use for academic purposes.
In connection with these classroom management systems, I found the setting up
of databases (in Wordpress and Moodle) very difficult. It was a good thing that it was
done by pair because we had the chance to discuss and try to infer what happened to
our computer during the activity that led to the error prompts we received. However,
after some time, even though we were just following the given steps, the activity
became stressful and frustrating because we had to keep proofreading the codes; trying
to make all of them work. Eventually, my partner and I were able to successfully
complete the activity. Despite the trouble we had to go through, I appreciate having
done this because it at least made us students more familiar with the steps on how one
2. can set-up a basic database. Hopefully, with more practice, I can come up with
something more complicated; with more useful features for the class.
Another activity that I enjoyed from the past few weeks was the HTML activity.
Having already learned about it in high school, this lecture and activity served as a
refresher for me. What I also liked about this lesson was that although I was already
relatively familiar with the basic codes, we were still taught codes that were new to me,
making the lesson more interesting. Here, I didn’t feel as lost as I did during the
database activity. In addition to this, although less comprehensive than our exploration
of the HTML code, I like that we were able to explore other codes like CSS and
JavaScript.
Still, my favourite topic is open source softwares. It is such a wonderful feeling to
know where and what to look for when I need a specific type of software. I think I’ve
come a long way from downloading just the demo versions of the softwares that still
need to be bought, to downloading free open source softwares that are just as good as
the proprietary softwares. Hopefully, I’ll be able to apply the things I learned about
classroom management systems, databases, and HTML codes as much as I have
applied my awareness of open source softwares.