Aurora's Space

I’ve just finished the last assignment for my second course with BCIT. I think I’ll be taking a break from that for a while when this one if finished. It’s not a lot of work, or very hard, at least not so far. Unfortunately I live in Canada and not, like, Sweden or something, so education = $$$$$ I’m still paying off trips and other things from 2008 and still seriously considering going to Star Wars Celebration 5, especially as there’s currently a seat sale to Orlando right now. Really, I suppose the trip should go (and maybe it still will) but every time I see or hear anything about Star Wars, I get all giddy about going. Well, okay, maybe not GIDDY exactly, but you get the picture… right?

And why did school get tossed? Well, I might do some courses here and there (hey, it’s always good for the taxes!) but I don’t think I’ll go ‘full steam ahead’ like I had planned. I was taking a web design course. Well, I have plans to ever be a designer of any kind as a day job. I’d just like to do it as a hobby, or on the side gig, or AT my day job. So I’m not sure I can continue to do the formal courses, at least as often… at least right now. I just need to TAKE THE INITIATIVE and buy books and red the web (instead of just adding links to Delicious and forgetting about them) and learn on my own. Cheaper and all that.

But wait, I tried that once before.

Hopefully I can schedule my ‘free time’ better in the future. You know, to cross stitch, learn and experiment with design and photography, travel, hike, update this site, write, work, deal with the house, communicate with the outside world… sleep. And that’s not including all the other things I want to do but actually ARE already on the backburner.

Yeah, I know. I REALLY need to cut something out. I’ve gotten better with Twitter. I no longer feel the need to read every tweet from every one of the 880 people I follow… though I still feel like I’m missing something. I just have really diverse interests and LOVE to learn and LOVE to be productive.

Anyone else feel the same way? Have you cut out something you REALLY love to do?

January…

In January I officially became “Aurora Lee”.

Well, on the internet anyway.  I got the nickname “Aurora” last year from a fellow RPer – well, was given to my character by her character, but it sort of stuck with me.  Not to mention that it is a much nicer name than my previous online handle, though I still use that old handle on fan boards.  When I looked at using the name in a more official capacity, I found that “Aurora” is more popular than I thought so I added the Lee.  In January 2009 I officially adopted Aurora Lee as my ‘personal’ handle and purchased aurora-lee.ca! With the new domain name came a new host (www.netfirms.ca) and, well, a ‘host’ of new tools to play with.  WordPress, Joomla and more.  I integrated many of these tools on my new site to experiment and learn new things.  It’s still a work in progress and when I get some time I’ll be streamlining it. (more…)

This week has been an interesting one… Two classes started on Tuesday and it’s been interesting trying to get back into the swing of readings and homework in amongst everything that I’ve added to my life since the last time I took any formal classes… especially as these are online courses.  Time Management!!  So far it’s been going well, of course, it’s only the first week!!

My first course is “Web Publishing”, part of the Web Technologies program offered at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT).  This is an online course focusing on XHTML coding with no synchronous learning.  This is your regular online college course, so I’ve paid $$$ for it and it will be my focus.  It is also the introductory course to the program, which I hope to continue on it.  So far we’ve just had a few readings and some coding practice.  I need to do that assignment, though it’s not due until next week.  Looks like an interesting course and program and I’m looking forward to it!

The other course I started this week is ECI831 – Social Media and Open Education.  This is a graduate university course with 20 registered, for-credit students and approximately 200 (including myself) ‘auditing’ students.  There is a synchronous Elluminate session every Tuesday and various readings (both assigned by Alec, the instructor, and user generated, either through blog posts written by the students or links, videos, tools, etc. we have tagged), videos and activities to work through as the week progresses.  Twitter is a big part of the course.  It’s very interesting and an excellent format for learning this subject matter – jump into the deep end, I say!

An Introduction

The main assignment for this week was to post an introductory video.  You can view mine below:

As I didn’t really want to have to look at a video of myself or hear myself talk, I chose this format.  Let me tell you a bit more about myself then I was able to in this video.  I’m not a teacher.  I am an administrative assistant with the Nova Scotia Community College.  My office works specifically with educators of children.  My job is fairly flexible; I’m able invent and modify tasks on a regular basis to suit my talents and interests.  I’m always looking for new ways to try and market our services.  Currently I’m experimenting with social media and trying to make our established web site more interactive and user-friendly.  Starting this semester I will also start to deliver workshops around my areas of expertise and I’m looking for new and interesting ways to engage our clients and make the ifnormation more accessible.  In general, I’m simply interested in learning about ways to make learning more engaging, fun and useful for learners of all ages, while still being aware of security and privacy.  I believe the subject matter in this course, and the topics that will come out of it on the ‘back channel’ is a huge step in that direction.