Hi! My name is Callie. I am working on a dual master's degree: Instructional Technology and Library Sciences. It's an odd combination, but I'm enjoying it so far. The dual degree was a result of always wanting a future career in the library and also growing to love my current career in instructional technology. The two fields are very complimentary-- one is teaching me how to find information; the other, how to use it and show others. This is my second purely online course in the MSIT program, so I'm still getting the hang of it.
Last month was my three-year anniversary working at Belhaven University, a small liberal arts college in Mississippi. As Curriculum Coordinator, I connect non-traditional instructors with their curriculum/course materials as well as maintain the online course pages for the Adult Studies program (that is all of the night classes on each branch campus). It's not a job I ever expected or prepared for in school, but I love it and can see how much the field is growing. Working in instructional technology has familiarized me with many different online resources. I can't write code or anything like that, but computers and software come pretty easy to me. I've built several websites in Weebly and prefer it to other website builders, so I'm glad to use it in this course. At work I'm always in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Adobe PDF, but Publisher and Access are a bit of a mystery. As far as electronic communication goes, I've used email, discussion boards, and chat within the Collaborate window. I constantly get emails from the USM MLIS listserv, but very rarely read them. Listserv feels like junkmail...maybe I'm not using it correctly... Discussion boards are a good way to interact with classmates, but Blackboard doesn't allow participants to subscribe to individual threads . That feature would be handy. With the advancement of technology, education is having to get creative with resources. Blogs, podcasts, and video clips are all great tools. Right now I feel like podcasts are one of the greatest secrets in education (and in life--I'm addicted). One of my library classes used podcast clips, which was not the best way to use the resource. With podcasts, it's best to find a topical show that is updated often, otherwise it's the same as watching a YouTube clip from 1990. Wikis are a great tool for students to learn basic linking procedures, but my experience with them is in group projects where all but one member of the group (me!) is allowed to be impatient and completely give up after confusing all the links. So wikis are best for individual assignments in my opinion. I'm not currently a teacher (unless you count Sunday School). However, my teaching philosophy is that students learn best through experience. We can talk about building websites all day, but the learning comes in the actual doing. This is a great first assignment for that reason. I'm excited to start this class!
5 Comments
Adrienne
6/8/2016 01:00:55 pm
Hi, Callie, I used to live in Belhaven! The school looked like a great place to work. Your job sounds really interesting! I'm glad we're in class together. :)
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Ming
6/11/2016 01:54:45 pm
Hi Callie,
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Callie
6/12/2016 06:42:01 pm
Hey Ming,
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Demetric DyAnn Williams
6/17/2016 05:39:57 am
Hi Callie:
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Alex
6/22/2016 03:10:02 pm
Hi Callie!
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Callie is a graduate student of Library Sciences and Information Technology at the University of Southern Mississippi. Blogroll
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