thanks everyone for the lovely comments
posts for now will be on my travel blog
30secs of internet left, better go.
K

Web project and final essay reflection

Yes, That Means I Have FINISHED. Not only this course, but everything for this semester. Only 7 hours now til I fly to the Whitsundays for a very welcome break. But before I do, I thought I'd comment on my project.

Although I had messed around with a website before, it was a very long time ago, and, as I recall, very simple. I think websites in general were a lot simpler in 1998. This project forced me to learn the skills to produce at least a basic site, and gave me a lot of ideas for future creations. Although I'm not 100% happy with my final product, I think it is a good first experiment. There are, however, a lot of things I would either do diferently next time, do before I use the site and/or may do in the future to improve and expand the site.

For example I would:

• add an instruction to write the scores of the HP (etc) exercises in the word document.
• while I don't care what they are, they may make the students take more care. Or may be a bad idea if they make students anxious.
  
• add pictures and bells and whistles
• I know it could be prettier. And the background makes some things hard to read. And the colour scheme... well. I'll stop there.
  
• Add a "tell/write a story from your culture" or "listen to these stories online" extension activity.
  
• I suggested some extension stories in my essay, some of which could be done as individual or pair work extension activities. Of course, the extension activitites may become longer than the actual activities, in which case I could just make more of them required!
  
• Use tables more as fake frames.
• I have to admit I haven't mastered frames - this time round I didn't even try, due to time constraints. I did master tables, though, and I think I could give the illusion of frames by making the same table on each page with the appropriate links in it. Might make navigation and the process clearer. It would also make it easier to put each step on a separate page, perhaps with a "next" button.
  
• actually register for hot potatoes so that I can write longer and better exercises.
• I should have this time, but I only wanted short activities anyway. Really.

I'm sure there are other things I would do to fiddle with it. I am thinking of adding a teacher page, with most of my essay as procedure and justification, just in case anyone else ever wanted to use it. And wanted to be informed.

Although I haven't had any comments from class members yet (and don't expect them til after the assignment is due) I did ask my friend Kate to look at the page and check for anything I missed. She also went through and did all the exercises, not only making sure they worked, but also that I hadn't written anything impossible, or ambiguous. Her comments were positive, although she didn't like the crossword program very much. I agree that there are better ones out there, but perhaps not so easy to use, or so free.

I will comment on others' projects just as soon as I have slept. Although I won't have time in the morning, and I'm not sure when my next internet access will be. I will though.

So that's it.
I'm done.

WooHoo!

Website mostly published

I've only spent all night on it, but I have something to show for it. Ran into problems with my bigpond space - it seems my router doesn't like it or something. There's a blockage somewhere. Until that gets sorted (if ever), my page is here, but it's not quite finished. I thought it was, but once it published, I realised I had forgotten to add the link the JCross, and I think there is another place that needed an added instruction. And, as new links seem to open in the new window, I will have to put an instruction somewhere about right clicking to open each link in a new window, and not lose the original one. But Feel Free to post comments etc.
This has become another delirious ramble. Ah well. I've handed in my Grammar assignment today (only 12 minutes after the deadline and after only getting 4 hours of sleep because I was writing it all night) and re-read the methodology one I finished the other day, fixed up a couple of things and sent it in too. Culture was done last week, so now this is the Very Last Assignment. And I have 31 hours til have I have to leave for the airport. And two night sleep needed...
I can see myself finishing this on the boat - at least I'll internet access for the first night!
Argh.

I *do* get free webspace

Finally discovered that I do get free webhosting with bigpond . Now I just have to get that copy of dreamweaver so that I can create something coherent to put on it...
After I've finised my methodology essay.

FREE WEBSPACE FOUND

I think, anyway. This evening I was reminded by the lovely Kate about Angelfire, a free webhosting service. I should have remembered its existancethe other night. It gives you 1GB free space, AND allows for the easy uploading of a dreamweaver page. Or one from a variety of different web page editors, for that matter. Ihaven't tried uploading yet, but I've signed up, and so far so good. I know lots of people with angelfire sites, and have known about it for years, so I think it's trustworthy and that sort of thing. You get targetted ads on your site, but that's ok. Better than paying for webspace.
Good luck, and anyone who tries it, report back on whether or not it's any good!

Post-Friday-Drop-In-Session

The biggest hurdle that arose from our discussion on Friday, was webspace. If our QUT H drives aren't doing what they should, or what we thought they should, then we need a space that is accessible from anywhere (not just within the QUT network) to host our units of work. I'm exploring options here, as my family has a bigpond account, and, if we get free webspace at all, I can use it (I know no one else here is!).
I don't feel I achieved a lot yesterday, but at least having that mini-deadline meant that I spent thursday night really sorting out what I was doing on both the lesson plan and rationale. I wrote an actual lesson plan sort of thing, so I know how my activities will fit together, and what else I need (have to actually write a Jquiz for reading comprehension, I think). I also started the rationale, with description of learners and environment pretty much done. I just need to find some references to fill out my pedagogical reasoning, and actually write the thing. Oh, and put the lesson procedure on a website or something with the resources and activities either embedded (sounds tricky) or linked to.
For now, it's all on the back burner as I work on my assignment for Language and Culture, due Monday. I'll be happier when it's in - I'll only have 6500 words to write in a week, instead of 9000 in 10 days.
Argh.

3am again

Thankyou Sascha! I was having a terrible time trying to work out what I could do that was slightly interesting or useful with some of the Hot Potatoes, and wishing there was some sort of sentence ordering program instead. The two Tex Toys, Rhubarb and Sequitor that Sascha mentioned on her latest blog are exactly the sort of thing I was after. I now have a Jcross, 2 rhubarb and 2 sequitor activities for the 2 dreamtime stories I have chosen. I still have to make them pretty and all that, but at least the texts are there.
I'm not overly happy with the two stories I found, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of aboriginal stories available in text form online. There are many audio ones, but I don't think my students will have headphones on the computers in the summer school, so I don't think I want to risk using them as an integral part of a unit of work. I want to try to use them outside the computer lab though.
Much work yet to do, but at least I have an idea of where to go next. This is good, as I have 4 assignments due in the next two weeks - 9000 words worth, I think. Knowing what I'm doing is a definite positive.