Hi, my name is Megan Kohler. I’m from a little town in eastern PA known as Catawissa. Very few people have ever heard of it so most of the time I just tell people I’m from Bloomsburg, which is a town that is about 20 minutes away. Most people know where Bloomsburg is.
My interests include the performance arts, education, learning design, and interpersonal communications. My undergrad degree was a double major in theater and communication studies, and I work for a touring company doing educational theater to pay my way through college.
I’m taking this class because I want to be challenged. I want to rethink how we use technology in online courses and how we can use it to make the online learning environment more interesting and engaging for students.
I think probably the most interesting things about me, are my love for traveling, hiking, and photography. My husband and I are actually planning a trip to Italy next fall and have plans to vacation in Napa Valley the following year.
I wouldn’t exactly call myself a tech savvy person, but I’m not afraid to explore new technologies either. Although, I have to admit that I usually end up getting myself somehow stuck and then I have to ask one of the really tech savvy guys in our office to help me out.
In all honestly I used to hate technology. I remember sitting in a required computer class being forced to program a “game” that was basically a multiple-choice question and we had to program it to identify if the answer was correct or incorrect. The teacher didn’t really know what they were doing and couldn’t help us but graded us really harshly – it was terrible!! Since then technology has come a long way and has started to woo me back. 🙂
I think technology has the ability to impact our students in ways that make learning something that students want to do. With all the technology that is available to us today, we have so many opportunities to change traditional learning. I think many students have become so focused on getting an “A” that they loose sight of actually learning. If we can utilize technologies that they are interested in, we could meet them on a level that appeals to them and help them become interested in engaging.
Cole W. Camplese says
I’m happy to see you in the class! I am hoping that it is challenging in ways that will help to influence your design. Welcome!
Chris Millet says
I think it’s really important to have had experiences as a student where technology was used very poorly in a classroom. It’s so easy to become so enamored with a particular technology that when you as a teacher integrate it into your instruction that you can’t or don’t empathize with the students who have to use it. It’s amazing how different your attitude about technology can be when you’re using it as a teacher vs. as a student.