FAQ: How can CDLI benefit me as an Educator?

As noted in the ‘About Us’ section, CDLI’s activities relate to three general categories:

• eLearning in the K-12 setting;
• Information, Communication and Learning Technology (ICLT) Integration; and
• Teacher Professional Development.

These areas form the basis for a number of ways in which CDLI may be of benefit to you as an educator.

Online Resources

CDLI has developed a large quantity of online resources than can be used by both teachers and students. To access these, just navigate to the learning content area and follow the links. The materials are organized by subject area and are of three types:

• Regular content: complete sets of instructional materials for a course that use mainly text and graphics as media but which also make some use of other media such as audio, and Adobe® Flash®.
• Multimedia Learning Object (MLO) content: short Adobe® Flash® - based objects that provide instruction around a limited number of outcomes. These give focused instruction in particular subject areas.
• Course Review Support: materials intended to assist with the preparation for Senior High provincial exams. These are housed within Desire2learn courses and use a series of MLOs to provide a multimedia-based, comprehensive review of the course content.

Teachers may use these as part of their regular routine. Here are some ways they have been used:

• empowering students who wish to move ahead at their own pace;
• serving as supplementary resources;
• serving as a foundation or as a source of ideas for daily lesson plans;
• providing a source of good activities for homework or independent study; and
• providing remediation, as required.

ICLT Integration

CDLI oversees a large variety of ICLT integration projects. These are generally of two types:

• Classroom-focused projects in which the scope of the project is limited to a small number of classrooms. Examples include the music and mathematics integration projects.
• Province-wide projects. Examples include the Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) project and the Province-wide software licensing program.

Blackboard Collaborate rooms.

As part of its provincial license for the Blackboard Collaborate software CDLI is able to offer registered teachers in this province access to their own room. These Blackboard Collaborate rooms are identical to the ones used by CDLI for day-to-day teaching and may be used in support of other teaching activities. Some potential ideas for use include:

• providing some of your daily instruction in the online environment;
• recording tutorials and other instruction materials for students to access at any time;
• linking with resource persons so that they can virtually ‘visit’ your classrooms; and
• collaborating in real time with colleagues.

To create and access your own room, just log in to CDLI and click the ‘request your own room’ link. A room will be created for you and you will be given information on how to access it and how to invite colleagues and students to join you.

CDLI Programming in Your school

Finally as an educator, you might consider the potential that CDLI holds for providing programming to your school. If you are in a small school in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador that is not currently availing of CDLI’s services this may be worth a look. Here are some things you might consider:

• Would a particular program be strengthened in my school by working with CDLI to add courses not currently taught?
• Are there individual students or small groups of students in my school who could use CDLI to avail of a course that would not otherwise be offered?
• Are there individual students in my school’s catchment area who could benefit from CDLI because they are not able to attend school?

You might consider discussing these items with the administration team at your school.