CIQ -- Billings

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It this point in the semester, I would like you to complete a "Critical Incident Questionnaire." The purpose of this questionnaire is to provide me with some feedback on where you are currently. Here are the questions I would like you to address:

1. At what moment in class have you felt most engaged with what was happening?
2. At what moment in class were you most distanced from what was happening?
3. What action that anyone (teacher or student) took thus far did you find most affirming or helpful?
4. What action that anyone took thus far did you find most puzzling or confusing?
5. What about the class thus far surprised you the most? (This could be about your own reactions to what went on, something that someone did, or anything else that happened.)

Critical Incident Questionnaire

1. I have felt most engaged when I am actually involved with the class – the projects have helped me realize I know more about tech than I knew. Frankly, I am not sure how much of this I would have been able to use if I had taught in the US, with fewer resources. I have taught with Google Docs, Smartboards (not enough!), PowerPoints, iPhoto, and podcasting. My class web page has an assignment calendar and I am uploading assignments to studnes, who must download them and then upload their work. We should have a class wiki functioning when I return from Montana in mid-October, and I am building online work for them to do through Moodle, so I can monitor the class even when I am in the US and they are in China. By December, I will have my Class webpage built using Dreamweaver, and I am improving my skills with Adobe Photoshop. Cool beans!

2. I am distant when I am not able to use the Internet, it comes and goes here. Hard to believe, but at one point in the past, “Big Brother” decided it needed the school’s domain name and took it over. We lost the Net for about 10 hours today, when workmen fixing a plumbing problem in the next flat did something with a drill. Frustrating, since this was my best day for working on MSU-B stuff. Now, in eight hours, Jack and I will be leading the G11 and G12 classes on a field trip to western China and won’t return until Thursday evening. The first night will be spent in a lodge atop a mountain, and I’m not sure how much internet access I will have – there is a two hour hike to get there. However, even when I am not working on my MSUB lessons, it is always on my mind, and in a good way. Refreshing to take stock in all that I have learned and experienced since becoming a teacher.

3. Mostly, just reassuring comments from Bill Weber and Lynette, my other online instructor. I have known Lynette when I was an on-campus student, and she has been very supportive during the past week.

4. What has been puzzling and confusing so far has not been a human, but an inanimate object – I detest the MSUB online course format. Not user friendly, hard to navigate, never sure if I have completed my assignments, and the email pane is very difficult to see. Broke my glasses (not been my month!) and haven’t been able to see some of the buttons. I understand that email management is better with the MSUB class messages staying within that domain, but I find it frustrating that I cannot just receive my email in my normal Gmail account – would be much faster, and easier to read. Technology has not been my friend this week; wasted three hours trying to buy flight tickets home for dad’s memorial service and the Net kept crashing, had to call cheaptickets.com to secure my tickets, and got disconnected in the middle of my Skype conversation. Finally gave up and had a local travel agent book them. Enough complaining, already! Oh, and Toby hasn’t come home, and is probably gone for good. Very sad.

5. Class surprise? Not sure if I would use that term, other than like I said, surprised at my own competence with tech. My proficiency crept on me, I have been using a lot of it without stopping to think about it.