Weeks 1 thru 3 copied from JournalHome

Tuesday, January 22, 2008 - Week 3 - Thoughts
I decided to start my blog entry early. I'm having problems with this blog. Herb is unable to add comments to my blog, and my instructor sent me an email that she also added comments but I can't view them.
How did Mark log on and add comments?
This is all new to me and it is a bit frustrating on my part. I was able to log onto Google's blog but it comes up in Japanese. It took me awhile to figure out the "katakana" but once I got in, a message popped up saying that I needed to turn-on my "cookies". Having very little technical skills in working with computers, I'm just so afraid to touch my laptop and make my own adjustments because I wouldn't know how to correct myself. In this area, I'll admit, I need face-to-face assistance.
Clarice 1/22/08 Japan

The American economy is having a terrible effect on the dollar to yen exchange rate. The value of the dollar has fallen so fast that I still have uncashed Travelers Checks. You can get a slightly better exchange rate if you had American dollars. CNN Asia is all about business and it doesn't look good right now. While working on my OTL courses, I have to think about how to stretch my yen...the cost of living in Tokyo is one of the highest in the world. Other Americans living in another part of Tokyo told me that some of them are paying $20,000 USD per month for an apartment! I guess it more tofu and less meat. Today was the first time I made a baked tofu...haven't tasted it yet.
Clarice 1/22/08 Japan

Nobody in my house wants to try my tofu steak...well it was worth a try. It wasn't bad, but Japanese food just doesn't have that California-Mexican kick to it! I was able to download all of the readings except for one article. I'll start reading today.
Clarice 1/23/08 Japan

My sister sent me an email. My aunty passed away last night. I have a good mother, but she was just too busy trying to raise 5 kids back then, so I landed up at my aunty's house quite a bit. You could say that she was my holiday and weekend mother. I learned how to cook by watching her in the kitchen. I read two of my required articles for class and then I decided to make banana bread. I was planning to make it tomorrow but I just felt today was the day to do it. The sun was shining, the sky was blue with some puffly clouds. I opened up my kitchen blinds which I normally don't do, since my neighbors apartments are so close...but it didn't matter to me today. I baked banana bread...I even made a batch of baked Italian chicken, and it's only 2:30 in the afternoon. My aunty believed in education. She saw this as a way out of poverty and a means by which to secure a good job. She wouldn't want me to mess up on my school work right now...she'd be upset.
Clarice 1/24/08 Japan

It looks like my group is just moving along quite well with Susan and Marsha's input. We've come to an agreement on our topic. Now I'm just waiting for more input as to how we will divide up the research. I hope I'm on the right track. My mind is a bit far away at the moment, but I know I'll be better tomorrow.
Clarice 1/24/08 Japan
Bb is quite slow right now so I decided to post my thoughts here so I don't forget. "I agree with Susan that a wiki would be very helpful in creating an outline for this paper. As a foreigner living in Japan, I am personally interested in best practices for building community and encouraging interactivity among students who live and work within a collective culture like Japan." DVD I want to watch, ?Downside or ?Sideline - foreign movie about Iranian girl who wants to watch her country's male soccer team compete for title against Japanese team. Issue here: Women are not allowed to watch men play, yet Japanese women are allowed into the soccer stadium to watch the championship. Here in Tokyo, the Iranian Embassy is not far from my apartment. All female employees, no matter what nationality, wear a "burka" at all times. The only uncovered portion of their body is their face...no ears, no neck, partial forehead, etc. Life is different in Tokyo.
Clarice 1/25/08 Japan
Curtis and Susan both posed some very good and interesting question on the group DB. I spent some time looking up information in order to answer their questions. What I have learned from this research (past two days) is that our cultural anthropologist and sociologist have a lot to offer educators in the way of providing some very important insights in how to best educate those from outside our own culture. At the Tokyo American Club library, I found a book that I hope to read before this course ends, "Importing Diversity: Inside Japan's JET Program" by David McConnell, published in 2000 by the University of California Press. After reading the introduction, it touches on both Susan and David's question.
Clarice (1/25/08) Japan
Summary of what I learned this week:
I never considered culture and it's effect online learning until I took this course. Now that I have had a chance to read some very good references on this subject given to us by our instructor, I am beginning to see the importance of understanding culture and it's impact on learning and more specifically learning in the online environment. I've started to look into Japanese education which is a new for me and quite interesting.
I'm a foreigner living in Japan, and though I notice the differences between the U.S. and Japan, I'm in survival mode about 80% of the time - read a menu, tell my hair stylist how short to cut my hair, directions to an English-speaking medical clinic, read "katakana" or "hiragana" so I get off at the right subway station, finding grocer items, explain to my apartment management company that the heater doesn't work, my cat has a medical problem and needs attention, etc.




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Monday, January 21, 2008 - Week 2 - Thoughts
Small successes: 1. I was able to change the template from "Hello Kitty" to something I am more comfortable with...plain simple colors. Questions: 1. I'm still not sure how to adjust privacy on this blog. I just switched the privacy command from "everyone" to "friends". To my OTL classmates, pease let me know if you have a problem viewing my blog. 2. Still haven't figured out how to add a single space between my paragraphs.
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Monday, January 21, 2008 - My thoughts for the week
Posted by Clarice
I'm not very comfortable with technology and being that this assignment required me to create my own blog, it was a bit stressful for me.
Still unsure about the privacy of my blog despite changing settings. I can't tell if it is working or not. Because of this, I feel that I have to be very careful about what I write on my blog.
I didn't have a problem with group formation. I am looking forward to working with this group. It looks like we have similar interests with some overlap so I am pretty confident about having to select a group topic.
I figued out how to create a paragraph; Yeah!!!...happy : ).
It's not difficult to bounce back-and-forth between blogs to read what my teammates have in mind for a project, but it does take time. I'm not sure if this is the best way to go about negotiating a team project.Edited by Clarice on Monday, January 21, 2008 at 5:37 AM
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Saturday, January 26, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Posted by dutchboy
Your entry Week 3 - thoughts is invisible to me, and also to the rest of the world. If you want your classmates to read it, you'll have to get them to sign up with JournalHome (they're certainly not obliged to blog in any way) and you should add them as friends. For that everyone should go to this page within their accounts:http://www.journalhome.com/manager/view_friends.phpThere's an Add Friends button on that page, and the easiest thing to do would be for all of them to add 'Clarice' as a friend. After that you only have to go to that page yourself and each of them. It's all pretty self-explanatory. Don't add me unless you want me to read your stuff. There's little else to be gained by it. Or you could make your blog public again, or select with each entry which ones you would like to be private, public, members only or friends only.Edited by dutchboy on Saturday, January 26, 2008 at 11:13 AM
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Tuesday, January 29, 2008 - Thank You Dutch Boy and Admin Staff
Posted by Clarice
I changed my setting to allow "everyone" in since I am not sure about "adding friends". When you add a friend, does this mean that you just type in their name?Clarice
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Tuesday, January 29, 2008 - Adding friends
Posted by dutchboy
If you want to add a friend you have to type in his or her username, which in your case is Clarice. If you like someone else's blog enough to add the author, and you're not sure about the username, you click on "View my profile". Look at the URL, and whatever follows journalhome.com/profiles/ is the name you want.



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Sunday, January 20, 2008 - Unit 2 Assignment - Possbile Group Topic
Hi Everyone, Here's my thoughts on a possible group project for your consideration. My healthcare program was not prepared to move their F2F curriculum online. They did so without formal training, additional resources or faculty time. The continued development and improvement of an efficient online program continues to evolve, but at a very slow and uneven pace. Upgrades to each course has been done by individual faculty members and there is no consensus on cohesive development of the online curriculum. The program has not ruled-out online learning, but much of the courses are now offered in a hybrid format. The reasoning and justification from my program director is that the current student population prefers the F2F environment over the online environment. I suspect the faculty is more comfortable with the F2F format as well. The current student population is generally female, adult-learner, single parent, second career, low-income, working part-time and seeking a career track program that will land them a full-time job when they complete their certificate degree in the shortest amount of time. Faculty issues and personal views in regard to online learning is an important area to address, but for this course, I would like to do more research to answer the following question, “what are the most important features that need to be considered when designing an online environment (not a hybrid) that will increase time-on-task, student satisfaction and improve academic achievement given the student population mentioned above. A possible title could be ‘designing the online environment for the at-risk adult student population.’ Your thoughts on this would be appreciated even if this topic is not chosen. Clarice
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Tuesday, January 22, 2008 - Sounds good...
Posted by Mark
Clarice,Sounds like a good idea. Like you said, we have similar issues, addressing at-risk student needs. I don't know if you have looked at Herb's blog but he also addresses a similar question for his project idea.Great job.Mark



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Friday, January 18, 2008 - My First Personal Blog for CSUOTL 6707
My instructor asked us to create a personal blog and this is one of the recommended sites that was given to the class.
This is my first personal blog since all others were created within our Blackboard system.
- I don't know how my instructor or classmates are supposed to log into this site?
- I'm not sure if this blog automatically dates my entries.
- Does this have a spell-check feature?'
- How do I change my template design? Hello Kitty...must have clicked this my mistake
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Saturday, January 19, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Posted by dutchboy
Welcome to JournalHome. Here are a few answers to your questions. It does automatically date all entries, while the spell-check feature exists in theory only. It doesn't work. In order to change your template, you must go tohttp://journalhome.com/manager/choose_template.phpGood luck on JournalHome. Little did you know when signing up that we, the regulars here, view JH as a community rather than a bloghost, and we act accordingly, freely posting comments at each others blogs. Another good thing about JournalHome, is that upon having your account upgraded you have absolute freedom over all the technical features you want to have. Something which in most other bloghosts is too much to ask for. And I don't get paid to say this. Edited by dutchboy on 1/19/2008 at 10:41 AM
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Saturday, January 19, 2008 - Thank you
Posted by Clarice
Dutchboy,Thank you for your help. I was finally able to upload an image to my webpage! Small success.Clarice
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Sunday, January 20, 2008 - Dutchboy - Can you help with this question
Posted by Clarice
Hi Dutchboy,I wrote my proposal as a Word document. Then I did a copy and paste. I notice that my spacing does not show-up in the blog. I can see only one large paragraph.Does this mean that I cannot do a copy and paste command?Clarice
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Monday, January 21, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Posted by dutchboy
Spacing is a bit of a problem here. One way of solving it, is clicking on the HTML icon, and making sure that every paragraph is followed by . (Hopefully these tags show up in comments)Another way is to use shift+enter to create spacing between paragraphs.The only way you can be absolutely sure, is by writing your entries within JournalHome, in the basic editor. On the page where you write entries you can choose between either the 'basic'' or the 'advanced' editor. When the latter is true you're there. In the former case you click on 'switch to basic editor' or something similar.edit tags: br and br, inside <> and <>Edited by dutchboy on Monday, January 21, 2008 at 12:50 PM
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