The final reflection before the conclusion

April 19, 2010

I found that this week it has been hard to focus with the end so near to the course. We have been reading more data filled reports, which I found it hard to change over from theory as I was starting to really enjoy the challenge of reading a good theoretical perspective. Its similar to the construction of a skyscraper, as it is difficult to truly understand how a theory and a skyscraper are built, also the distance that skyscrapers and theories go is amazing. I feel that this course has really brought me a greater understanding of my learning and how I construct knowledge. I was reflecting a little bit ago about community as we have discussed it a great deal in this course, and I was thinking about a note that I had placed in the discussion cafe about my grandfather being extremely ill and me being out of WebTycho for that reason. This post had 11 responses with all wishes and prayers for me and my family. I have never been a true believer that online courses have a great deal of community; however, similar to face-to-face courses, I guess its not that their is no community, rather people just need to get warmed up to one another. Its moments like that post that you realize that many other learners are all in the group doing the same thing that you are doing and that their is a community that exist in e-learning. On a different note, the learning journal has been a challenge for me not only with learning how to reflect on my learning experiences but also the challenge of transferring everything from my thoughts to the word document and then from the word document to the journal (or blog). I keep looking back through my reflections and it is hard to believe what I had believed in the past. I thought about making edits; however, that would not be my true time line of learning experiences. I guess I now understand the value of the learning journal. Now that I am starting to understand the benefits of the learning journal, the project is coming to an end (the graded portion) and I want to keep writing.