My Online Learning Timeline


When I recorded my introduction video on Flipgrid, I mentioned that I'd had several unsuccessful attempts at engaging in online learning. I could only think of a couple courses I took recently and of how dissatisfied I was with their structures (or lack thereof). While I stand by what I said, it was also unfair to reduce my experience with online learning to events that only happened in the last few years. Being inspired by "The History of Online Learning", I am trying to dig deeper and create my own timeline.

 My journey with online learning goes hand in hand with my journey of learning the English language and American culture. English language instruction has always been deficient in Brazil and since my family could not afford enrolling me in a proper language institution, it was up to me to develop my skills elsewhere. As a kid, picking up English was never intentional. At 11 years old, I was too busy listening to boy bands and pop divas to rationalize the importance of being fluent in a foreign language. Even if I did not understand what the Backstreet Boys were saying, I wanted to sing along, so I would search for lyrics and translations on the computer. I wanted to know more about my idols' lives, so back to the computer I went. That meant I did not have to beg my mom to buy some of those teen magazines anymore - now I had to beg her to turn on the modem and use our dial-up connection!

My die hard fan girl phase brought me a lot more than learning Mariah Carey's favorite fruit. I created blogs about my favorite celebrities and since the best blogs on the internet did not use ready-made layouts, I was on a mission to learn how to customize mine. I ended up exploring the world of HTML and I also learned my way through Photoshop to create fan art. I found excellent tutorials in Portuguese, but there was more variety in English. All those days and nights following lyrics sheets and watching tv shows would paid off, I could read HTML and everything.

As I grew up and gradually let my teenage obsessions phase out, I saw myself in college, majoring in English (funny how things work, right?) and Portuguese. I lived far from college and the Internet saved me from spending hours and hours looking for books in the library, but online content was far from being 100% trustworthy. Granted, it never will be, but I consider myself bold enough to take chances when it was all quicksand. From college on, online learning became more conscious, more intentional, and more complex. It is amazing to think of how much our ways of learning have changed so much in just about 20 years time. 

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