Tag Archives: Flight Path

Not a Flight, But a Long Road Trip

Filling the Tank

My journey to and through the MET program has been a bit of winding road rather than a straight flight path. Long ago, at least, 15 years ago, I graduated from UBC and started teaching. I liked it, and I still from time to time think what it would be like to still be teaching, but at the time getting a full-time classroom position wasn’t the easiest thing to do. I ended up applying for, and was offered, a position as a Youth and Community Development Specialist with the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Lands. This was my first exposure to developing and delivering education programs outside of the K-12 system. It was a little eye-opening as although I had coached sports developing and delivering educational programs for youth and adults was something new and I was pleasantly surprised at how transferable my skills were outside of a traditional school system.

Then I found myself moving to Ottawa, to be with my now wife. I briefly considered trying to get back into the classroom, but was informed that getting a full time teaching job here could mean years on a supply teacher list. I ended up getting a job with the Canadian Tourism Human Resource Council (Now tourism HR Canada). I ended up taking over a program called the Canadian Academy of Travel & Tourism, a secondary school program aimed at promoting careers in tourism and hospitality. Eventually, my role at the council ended up morphing into an instructional design and consultancy role for tourism businesses across Canada and even some international pieces. This role really let me expand my skill set around competency-based training for the workplace and certification development. This is also where I was first able to explore how learning technologies can have an impact on workplace training, and my first experience with a Learning Management System (LMS). For the past year and a half, I have been the Education Manager at the Canadian Produce Marketing Association (CPMA).

As the Education Manager at CPMA I am responsible for developing and maintaining the industry facing elements that we develop. This role is a mix between developing online industry training materials and continuing to offer in-person programs at our annual Convention & Trade Show. The online materials are relatively new for the association and that had brought with it some challenges in both gaining an acceptable level of member engagement with the learning materials and with managing expectations around the development process. I’m responsible for running several programs, building our LMS, developing online training, producing podcasts, webinars, and whatever else seems to come along. I have some support from others in the organization, but I am technically the only member of the Education Department.

The Roadmap

My UBC MET journey has also been a bit of a winding road as well. I’m taking the long road around, one course at a time with a couple of breaks in between. Before I started the program, I wasn’t married, I had no children, and my girlfriend was halfway through her Master of Public Administration. My wife finished a long time ago and we just finished my daughter’s first birthday party. This is my eighth course, and I can’t count the number of skills that I have learned along the way.

Planning the Route

Learning Management Systems (LMS)

Although, I’ve been working with an LMS for a while there always seem to be new developments that I want to explore. In ETEC 522, I had a chance to explore the lite LMS phenomenon that seems to becoming a more popular solution for many companies. At CPMA, I am currently working with Moodle, but it has very much been a learn as I go process. I’m hoping that the chance to work with Moodle as part of ETEC 565A will provide me with the opportunity to solidify some of what I already know, and some of the tricks that I don’t have yet. In addition, I’d like to explore how or if an LMS, like Moodle, can interact with WordPress or other online environment for displaying content. Is this an example of the xAPI, or is it through some other method. I’d like to know the advantages and disadvantages for learners of offering content outside of an LMS.

Assessment

I am of two minds on assessment. From one perspective I want to explore expanding the assessment options that I currently use within the Moodle Platform. I think this can be realized through the ETEC 565A course material. The second, which may be fully outside of the course work, is to adapt the SECTIONS model proposed by Bates to develop a system of evaluating perspective education technologies for my professional life (2014). By using this model to assess and present education technologies to senior staff and volunteer committee members, I can clearly illustrate benefits and challenges for learners, association member, and the organization itself.

Social Software

The emphasis that this course has placed on twitter interactions has allowed me to finally focus on developing a personal twitter strategy. Currently, that strategy is limited to just using twitter more as an information source, and learning how to use it to communicate.

Multimedia

Multimedia is another topic that I have a few difference perspectives that I want to explore. First, I’m always interested in learning about new ways to present information and evaluating them against my current methods. Perhaps this is another adaptation of the SECTIONS method where I could change the emphasis to be on certain parts of the model (Bates, 2014). The second is that I want to see if there is a chance to evaluate and compare hardware in addition to software. How do hardware choices influence the impact on the final multimedia project?

In the end, I do know that “technology is not a panacea that suddenly transforms all learning” (Nel, Dreyer, and Carsten, 2010, p. 253).” It is as much the journey, choices, and experience that builds the learning experience.

References:

Bates, T. (2014). Teaching in digital age, Chapter 8. Retrieved from http://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/
Nel, C., Dreyer, C., & Carstens, W. A. M. (2010). Educational technologies: A classification and evaluation. Tydskrif vir letterkunde, 35(4), 238-258. Retrieved from

Kate’s Flight Path

I’ve wanted to be a teacher since the final years of high school, and perhaps a little too single-mindedly therefore tailored my University experience to ensure I left with the requisites required for my future ‘teachables’. Prior to going to teacher’s college I was accepted into the JET (Japanese Exchange Teaching) Programme, which placed English speakers into Japanese high schools through a government initiative. Before I left Japan I applied to teacher’s colleges in Ontario, undeterred by my difficult experiences overseas in my desire to teach. All I wanted to do was get into Toronto schools, and start working with students similar to those I went to school with – complicated, diverse, sometimes troubled, but always worth your time when you gave it to them. I was sure this was my path.

Seven years later, I have not taught a single day within any school board. I’ve volunteered, but have as of yet been shut-out of the system that I still feel so drawn to. I like to think it’s not because of some failing on my part, other than bland-looking qualifications – and while I’ve harbored disappointment I’ve decided that there must be something I’m meant to be doing in the meantime.

I consider my time within a small International private school in Mississsauga as fortunate, indeed, as it has been some of the most grueling work I’ve ever done. With five periods in a day and four periods to teach as a full-time teacher, plus all the mandatory extras we are required to do, it’s often felt like ‘teaching bootcamp’. I started in their English and ESL department, and after three years was offered an interim Head-ship as an LTO of sorts. When another department Head left a few months later I stepped over to fill the gap made in the Social Sciences department, and have been the Head there for the last two and a half years. Because of the slightly unorthodox nature to the school (I was a junior teacher instructing senior students, and a Head twice over without the usual requirements), the learning curve has been sharp – but that’s just how I like it. I’ve been able to grow as a leader, educator, and collaborator in a way that may have otherwise been restricted to me if I had immediately gotten into the public system.   Thanks to a Head of School with a love of technology, I have enjoyed a 1:1 device:student ratio, and the ability to apply many of the techniques and ideas learned in my progress through the MET thus far with total autonomy. I have, essentially, been given free rein to practice the ISTE Standards for Teachers (2016).

All of that said, I will be leaving the school at the end of January 2016, as I feel that the demands of the ‘business’ have begun to out-weigh the needs of the school, and my ability to continue growing is being pushed aside along with them. I have felt re-invigorated through the MET in the short year since I started, and given a direction within my teaching practice that I want to pursue with as much vigor as possible, while I can.

While I feel like less of a ‘novice professional’ than I did at the start of this program, I know I still have a great deal to learn about the ways in which technology can best serve our students. As cited in Chickering & Ehrmann (1996), while technology is not in itself ‘enough’ to meet standards of good practice (p. 6), it is the vehicle through which their seven principles can be met in convenient and rich forms.   To use figurative language, it opens up the world – and allows teachers to tell students their expectations, abilities, and preferences are also thusly open. As previously discussed in weeks past on our forums, however, teachers know this is a double-edged sword, as the chances for irresponsibility, abuse, and chaos are increased along with this freedom. So I suppose that is where an LMS comes in.

I have experience with LMSystems including: Edmodo, WikiClassrooms, and site platforms like iSites, Weebly, and Wix. I have learned how to navigate these through trial and error, with lots of online guides and YouTube videos as helpers. As of yet, I haven’t found one that best marries course content, assessment, social interaction, and student co-creation – but I admit this may be due to my own lack of time and expertise to experiment. I keep hearing about the mysterious ‘Moodle’, which as of yet is still an uncategorized creature in the wild I’ve only read about.

What I am most hoping to learn during this course, and the MET in general, is how to best use technology to guide students in their learning in way that teaches them not just course content, but skills like inquisitiveness, constructive collaboration, independent problem solving, and ‘grit’. I don’t know that further exposure to other kinds of LMS platforms is what I need (other than those darn Moodles), but instead the ability to personally evaluate and manipulate an LMS to meet my big pedagogical learning goals. The early readings we have done on how to best evaluate resources have helped bring this into focus, although I have not yet felt provided with (or motivated to) dig my hands in and start asking the really tough questions about how LMS platforms both succeed and fail our students. However, I do think that this will come with time; time I will be taking back from my demanding job and instead giving to my studies, and to questions I am ready to start investing in to answer.

 

References:

Chickering, A.W., & Ehrmann, S.C., (1996). Implementing the seven principles: Technology as lever. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 49(2), 1-6. Retrieved from http://www.aahea.org/aticles/sevenprinciples.htm

International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE). (2008). Standards for teachers. Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/standards/standards-for-teachers