About Me

Education, the knowledge society, the global market all connected through technology and cross-cultural communication skills are I am all about. I hope through this blog to both guide others and travel myself across disciplines, borders, theories, languages, and cultures in order to create connections to knowledge around the world. I teach at the University level in the areas of Business, Language, Communication, and Technology.

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Using online conferences in student learning

This semester, my students in my international marketing class are putting together an online conference in International Business Education.

It has been a long road to 1) get students to understand what an online conference would look like, 2) get student groups to work together, 3) get students to think off campus (many have only been using the resources of the college, not even looking to local resources).

However, I think finally there is a light at the end of the tunnel, albeit a bit late. Time is a factor my students always have trouble with. Surprisingly, they also are very myopic when it comes to the tools they know. For example, none of them were even considering using their networks on facebook, even though a number of them have friends studying abroad. In addition, trying to get them to use new technology such as delicious or a wiki has been a struggle.

I use these projects, however, as a learning tool for my students. In the end, the conference might not be that successful (I'm still holding out hope though). But learning things such as the amount of time something like this might take and how to use your network to market and gain access to information is more important. In a month, after the conference, students will be presenting in groups what they learned from the process of putting together and running the conference. This is when I will know if I have been successful or not.

Anyone interested in participating in the conference, I will be posting information as soon as my students email me what they have developed! Keep posted.

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