Interview with a tutor I

“I like it when I get the feeling that participants really use my tips”

She loves busy chats as well as hand-written love letters. She lives in Vienna and would like to show the city to her former e-students, but she would also like to travel around the world and visit them in their countries. Julia Jäger revealed her work experience as an e-learning tutor while sharing some of her personal views and projects in an e-interview with Carmen Macavei.

1. Have the learning patterns changed compared to ten years ago and if yes, how?

I don’t think so. I think there are more different tools to convey learning, but the natural learning patterns for all learners won’t change too much, I guess. Only their ability to use different ways of learning.

2. Your graduation thesis focused on the interaction and communication in tele-learning. Please make a short comparison between tele-learning and e-learning in terms of interaction intensity.

Difficult question, since tele-learning is an “old” term (in the US they used “tele” only when mentioning video presence) so, I think this is more a term of labeling a certain way of distributing learning content.

Apart from that eLearning should be interactive and that doesn’t mean “reading on the computer screen”, but multi-media examples and discussing with other learners and tutors.

3. Which part of your work as an e-learning tutor is the one you hate the most? Which one is the most rewarding?

I don’t like tracking – writing down what the participants have done or running after participants who didn’t submit on time. But then again, I like it when I get the feeling that participants really use my tips and comments and develop their projects. I love busy chats.

4. Could you refer to an intercultural experience occurred within your work that was particularly special for you?

Many. One was about “receiving a star”. This is a method of rewarding young schoolkids in Austria and Germany. They get a “star” in their booklet. One of my participants mentioned that (he is from Germany) and the others (from Africa and Asia) didn’t know about it. This was a nice discussion about cultural background. (Stars were handed out after that for all. ;-)

5. E-mails or letters? Meetings or virtual meeting?

Depends on the context. For work: Mostly emails and face to face meetings (sometimes skype-meetings) For private issues: Is there anything better than reading a hand-written love letter? (Come on guys, think of your loved ones!)

6. Is the Internet eventually an alienating medium?

I quite disagree. With weblogs, Wikis and ePortfolios, I think it gets personalized even more. The internet is a medium to use for different purposes and I think some of them are quite nice for individual communication and getting to know other people.

7. How do you see the future of e-learning in 10 years from now on?

Is this a job-interview? ;-)

I hope to develop my eLearning competences even more, but at the same work with people face to face, doing mediation in conflicts for example.

On a private side, I hope to start a family and live in a nice place.

8. Where would you organize the f2f "class reunion" with your former e-students and why there?

This is an awful question, I have got so many former e-students and all come from so interesting countries (Cambodia, Mongolia, Costa Rica, Namibia, and a lot more come to mind). I would love to do a world-trip and visit all of them, because I love traveling, but at the same time would invite them all to come to Vienna to show them my city.