My Name is ....

Hello everyone. ... My Name is Mireille .... said like Me-Ray. And that begins my introduction. x number of years, okay decades ago I the first born was name Mireille. My parents thought that it would be an easy name in both french and english .... ha ha ha. In those days it wasn't. Today given the global integration of countries my name is not as exotic as it once was. I still don't see too many with my name but I do come across my name once in a while. It's always such a wierd feeling.

So who am I? I'm French Canadian living in Toronto Ontario Canada currently on sabbatical from a VP of International Training job. That is not exactly true. I left my job ten ago to stay at home. I have always thought myself on sabbatical because I chose to take those ten years to accomplish a lot things - like travel around the world, renovate my home, take a number of courses including some post graduate courses in corporate education.

To keep up with both my field in corporate education and in technology I continue to write for a US based magazine called Training Media Review. I don't get paid to write for Training Media Review but the benefits outway the negatives. I get to choose the products I'm curious about and I get to learn, which is really my form of keeping up, about companies, about people, about topics, that I would never get to learn in my job. I like to think that this is what makes me very good at what I do.

I'm insatiably curious and have a wide range of interests ... too many but I'm not complaining; I don't think I have ever been bored in my life.

This Fall of 2010 I'm re-entering the work force with a lot more skills than I had when I first left; I was quite accomplished then.

Times have changed, my family is grown and it's now time to do what I do so well - build healthy learning enviornments where people can participate in their own learning through conversation and collaboration.

Every year I choose a focus of study and this year my focus is the online environment. The technology has changed considerably since I got my diploma in Online Education at the University of Toronto ten years ago. I have now become a "Newbie Learner" ..... Again!

I'm constantly in "newbie" mode but this time it's a bit different. I'm having to learn how to use tools liking blogger and twitter and by using these tools, i'm becoming more visible than I'm comfortable with.

I have a lot to learn to become a full participant in this Online Facilitation Course. I'll expand on that in my next couple of posts re my goals for both this course and for me as a learner.

Note to Myself

1. I need an ending, something cheerful. I will look at some clipart and something in color.
2. Look to find copy and paste button and spell check. It's a bit cumbersome to having to re-type what I wrote in my word document.