V2 TRAINING - eLearning Brisbane

V2Training has run workshops for hundreds of School, TAFE and private RTO teachers this year, and with our "ear to the ground" this is what we are hearing are the common physical Barriers to eLearning as we approach 2012.  Now is the time to remove these basic but common hurdles to implementing your eLearning strategy.

Barrier 1.  Locked-Down Laptops

Give your team computers that do the things they need to do.  Laptops in the hands of teachers are meant to be a tool for productivity, development and innovation.  Unfortunately security measures placed on many computers actually hinder the teacher from accessing modern web tools and using their computers in a productive and flexible way.  Securities important but don't give your tradesman a useless tool and expect a good job to get done.

This week I kicked off the first in a series of workshops on eAssessment as Professional Development for Vocational Teaching staff.  We discussed at length some of the strategies required to ensemble quality online assessments that work for teachers, learners and within the compliance framework of the AQTF.  The participants have included TAFE teachers, School teachers, Private RTO Trainers, Department Auditors and Technical Support staff from the VET sector.

One of the hot discussions coming out of these workshops is the concept of Authentication in eLearning, the big questions being, How do we know WHO has actually done an online test? the bigger question for me is, What Authentication methods are acceptable, reasonable, flexible and fair?

Signatures can be forged and there are many way of cheating Biometric Technologies that we are seeing emerge, such as the facial recognition tool demonstrated in this video from Nokia.

This guide aims to help you step by step in making an eBook using only free or open source tools. There are always new ways to do things emerging but at the moment we found this a good process.

A sample ebook is available here - Sample eBook (34M)

What is an eBook?

An eBook is an electronic book. It is designed to be read on an electronic device like an eReader, phone or tablet computer. It is portable, self contained and yet can contain text, images, media and hyperlinks.

The iPad is a great new form factor device … is it a useful device for education?

Certainly it can be useful for several reasons:

The iPad is super light and therefore convenient to carry for students. It can replace heavy textbooks as they become available as ebooks (this also has many media and search related advantages). Students are actively involved with the device as they type, pinch, view media, design etc … its tactile and engaging.