Welcome to the Funhouse

You will find here a mulititude of reflections, a myriad of experiences.  This is a showcase of the funhouse that has been my pursuit of a master degree in educational technology (MET) through the University of British Columbia (UBC).

My hope for you here is that you will experience a magazine feature of my house of learning.  This feature should exemplify the ways I have learned common or easily accessible technologies can enhance both language learning (my area of application) and levels of student engagement.  It should also reveal the theory-driven perspectives regarding educational technologies that will now guide me as a competent but discerning educator as I lead my own students - hopefully with greater efficiency - through their own funhouses of learning.

Visitor's notice

Artifacts have been chosen to represent the architectural design (theory) of the funhouse in addition to highlighting the experience of moving through its playful interior (application) and reflecting on how it can change its visitors (personal reflections on my experience).  While it is easy to get lost in an actual funhouse, my hope would be that you would find this one applicable, relevant and cohesive.  The funhouse is intended as a metaphor reflective of my journey through MET, not your journey through this, my ePortfolio.  Please peruse in accordance with your interests.

I will tell you, my visitors, that I hesitated to frame this for you as a funhouse.  I was reluctant solely in the aesthetics of what that might mean for the visual of this, my ePortfolio, a construction I wish to have a professional feel.  But truly, this metaphor - a funhouse - with the exception of crazy so-not-me primary colours and psychedelic swirls, fits.  And in the place of those crazy swirls and colours is a crazy stack of books like what you see in my header and all kinds of cyber-files reminiscent of my time and adventures, reflective of my learning.  It has been a crazy, whirlwind journey since I started in September of 2009, before the iPad was even on the market and Steve Jobs - r.i.p. - was still seeming an endless source of innovation.

But first, some introductions and clearing of assumptions...